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THE PRINCESS 



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THE 

PRINCESS 

BY 

ALFRED. LORD TENNYSON 

WITH DRAWINGS BY 

HOWARD CHANDLER CHRISTY 



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THE BOBBSMERR1LL COMPANY 
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PROLOGUE 






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PROLOGUE 



Sir \V\i.rnt Vivian all a summer's day 
Gave his broad lawns until the set of sun 
I'p to tin people; thither flock'd at noon 
His tenants, wife and child, and thither half 
The neighboring borough with their Institute. 
Of "Inch he was the patron. I was there 
From college, visiting the son,— tin son 
A Walter too. — with others of our -• t. 
Five others; we wen seven at Vivian-place. 

And me that morning Walter show'd the 

llOU-c, 

Greek, set with busts. From vases in tlu hall 
Flowers of all heavens, and lovelier than their 

names, 
Grew side bj side; and on the pavement lav 
Carved stones of tin Abbey-ruin in the park. 
Huge Ammonites, and the h"r>t bones of Time; 
And on the tables every clime and aire 
Jumbled together; celts and calumets, 
Claymore and snow-shoe, toys in lava, fans 
Of sandal, amber, ancient ros 



Laborious orient ivory sphere in sphere, 
The cursed .Malayan crease, and battle-clubs 
From the isles of palm: and higher on the 

wall-. 
Betwixt the monstrous horns of ilk and deer, 
Hi- own fori fathers" arms and armor liun^r. 

And "this." he -aid. *was Hugh's at Agin- 
court : 
And that was old Sir Ralph's at Ascalon. 
A good knight he! we keep a chronicle 

With all about him," — which he brought, 

and I 
Dived in a hoard of tales that dealt with 

knights 
Half-legend, half-historic, count- and kinijs 
Who laid about them at their wills and died; 
And mi\t with these a lady, one that arm'd 
Her own fair head, and sallying thro' 

the gat< . 
Had beat her foes with slaughter from her 

"alls. 



THE PRIN CESS 












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•(> miracle « > t" women,' said the book, 
'() noble heart who, being strait-besieged 
By this wild king to force her to his wish, 
Nor bent, nor broke, nor shunn'd a soldier's 

death, 
But now when all was lost or seem'd as lost — 
Her stature mop' than mortal in the burst 
Of sunrise, her arm lifted, eyes on fire — 
Brake with a blast of trumpets from the gate, 
And. falling on them like a thunderbolt, 
She trampled sonic beneath her horses' heels, 
And .some were whelm'd with missiles of the 

wall, 
And some were pusll'd with lances from the 

rock, 
And part were drown'd within the whirling 

brook : 

miracle of noble womanhood!' 

So sang the gallant, glorious chronicle: 
And. I all rapt in this, "Come out,' he said. 
'To the Abbey ; there is Aunt Elizabeth 
And sister Lilia with the rest.' We went — 

1 kept the book and had my finger in it — 
Down thro' the park. Strange was the sight 

to me; 
For all the sloping pasture nuimiur'd, sown 
With happy faces and with holiday. 
There moved the multitude, a thousand heads; 
The patient leaders of their Institute 
Taught them with facts. One rear'd a font 

of rtone 
And drew, from butts of water on the slope, 
The fountain of the moment, playing, now 
A twisted snake, and now a rain of pearls, 
Or steep-up spout whereon the gilded hall 
Danced like a wisp: and somewhat lower down 
A man with knobs and wires and vials fired 
A cannon! Echo answer' d in her sleep 
From hollow fields: and here were telescopes 
For azure views ; and there a group of girls 
In circle waited, whom the electric shock 
Dislink'd with shrieks and laughter; round 

the lake 



A little clock-work steamer paddling plied 
And shook the lilies: perch'd about the knolls 
A do/en angry models jetted steam; 
A petty railway ran; a fire balloon 
Rose gem-like up before the dusky groves 
And dropt a fairy parachute and past; 
And there thro' twenty post-, of telegraph 
They flash'd a saucy message to and fro 
Between the mimic stations: so that sport 
Went hand in band with science: otherwhere 
Pure sport : a herd of boys with clamor howl'd 
And stump'd the wicket : babies roll'd about 
Like tumbled fruit in grass: and men and 

maids 
Arranged a country dance, and flew thro' 

light 
And shadow, while the twangling violin 
Struck up with Soldier-laddie, and overhead 
The broad ambrosial aisles of lofty lime 
Made noise with Iwes and breeze from end to 

end. 
Strange was the sight and smacking of the 

time; 
And long we gazed, but satiated at length 
Came to the ruins. High-arch'd and ivy- 

claspt, 
Of finest Gothic lighter than a fire, 
Thro' one wide chasm of time and frost they 

gave 
The park, the crowd, the house: but all within 
The sward was trim ;us any garden lawn. 
And here we lit on Aunt Elizabeth, 
And Lilia with the rest, and lady friends 
From neighbor scat> : and there was Ralph 

himself. 
A broken statue propt against the wall. 
As gay as any. Lilia, wild with sport. 
Half child, half woman as she was. had wound 
A scarf of orange round the stony helm, 
And robed the shoulders in a rosy silk. 
That made the old warrior from his ivied nook 
Glow like a sunbeam. Near his tomb a feast 
Shone, silver-set: about it lay the guests, 
And there we join'd them: then the maiden 

aunt 



A MEDLEY 



Took this fair day for text, and from it 

preach'd 
An universal culture for the crowd. 
And all tilings great. Hut we, un worthier, 

told 

Of college: he had climb'd across the spik. s, 
And he had squeezed himself betwixt the bars, 
And he had breathed the Proctor's dogs; and 

one 
Discussed his tutor, rough to common men. 
Hut honeying at the whisper of a lord: 
Ami one the .Master, as a rogue in grain 
\ iM with sanctimonious theory. 

Hut while they talk*d. above their heads I 

>a\v 

The feudal warrior lady-clad; which brought 
My book to mind, and opening this I read 
Of old Sir Kalph a page or two thai rang 
With tilt and tourney; then the tale of her 
That drove her foes with slaughter from her 

walls, 
And much I praised her nohleiiess, and 

'Where,' 
A-k'd Walter, patting Lilia's head- sh< lay 
Beside him — 'lives there such a woman now?' 

Quick answerM I. ilia: 'There are thousands 

now 
Such women : hut convention beats them down ; 
It i- but bringing up; no more than that. 
You 11K11 have done it — how I hate you all! 
Ah, were I something great! I wish I were 
Some might} poetess, I would shame 

von then. 
That love to keep us children. ( ). I wish 
That I were somi ureal princess, I would build 
Far off from men a college like a man".-. 
And I would teach them all that men are 

taught : 
We are twice a- quick !* And here shi shook 

aside 
The hand that play'd the patron with her 

curls. 



And "in 1 -aid smiling: 'Pretty were the 

sight 
If our old hall- could change their sex, and 

flaunt 
With prude- for proctors, dowagers for deans, 
And sweet girl graduati - in th< ir golden hair. 
I think they should not wear our rusty gowns, 1 . 

Hut mo\c as rich as Emperor- ths, or Ralph 

Who shine- -o in the corner; yet I fear. 
If there were many I. ilia- in the brood, 
However deep you might embower tin nest, 
Some boy would spy it.' 

At this upon the sward 
She tapt her tiny silken-sandall'd foot: 
•That*- your light way; but I would make it 

death 
For any male thing hut to peep at us.' 



Petulant she spoke, and at herself she 
laugh'd : 
A rosebud set with little wilful thorns. 
And sweet as English air could make her. she! 
Hut Walter hail'd a score of names upon her, 
And 'pettv Ogress,' and 'ungrateful Puss,' 
Anil -won he long*d at college, only long'd, 
All else wa- well, for she-society. 
They boated and they cricketed: they talk'd 
At wine, in chili-, of art. of politics; 
They lost their weeks; they vext the soul- of 

dean- : 
Tin \ rude: they helled: made a hundred 

frii nds, 
And caught the blossom of the flying terms. 
Hut miss'd the mignonette of Vivian-place, 

The little hearth flower I. ilia. Thus he spok< . 
Part banter, part affection. 

'True' she said. 
'We doubt not that. O. yes, you miss'd us 

much ! 
1*11 stake my ruby ring upon it you did.' 

She held it out : and a- a parrot turns 
I'p thro' gill wire.- a crafty loving eye, 
And takes a lady's finger with all care. 



THE PRIN CESS 



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Ami bites it for true heart and not for harm, 
So he with I. ilia's. Daintily --lu- shriek'd 
Ami wrung it. "Doubt my word again!' he 

said. 
'Come, Listen! here is proof thai you were 

miss'd : 
We seven stay'd at Christmas up to read; 
And there we took one tutor as to read. 
The hard-grain'd Muses of the cube and 

square 
Were out of season; never man, I think. 
So moulder'd in a sinecure as lie; 
For while our cloisters echo'd frosty feet, 
And our long walks were stript as hare as 

brooms, 
We did but talk you over, pledge you all 
In wassail ; often, like as many girls — 
Sick for the hollies and the yews of home — 
As many little trifling Lilias — play'd 
Charades and riddles as at Christinas here, 
And what's my thought and when and where 

and how, 
And often told a tale from mouth to mouth 
As here at Christmas. 9 

She remember'd that ; 
A pleasant game, she thought. She liked it 

more 
Than magic music, forfeits, all the rest. 
But these — what kind of tales did men tell 

men. 
She wonderM, by themselves? 

A half disdain 
Perch'd on the pouted blossom of her lip-; 
And Walter nodded at me: '//<■ began. 
The rest would follow, each in turn: and so 
We forged a sevenfold story. Kind? what 

kind? 
Chimeras, crotchets, Christmas solecisms; 
Seven-headed monsters only made to kill 
Time by the fire in winter.' 

'Kill him now. 
The tyrant ! Kill him in the summer too,' 
Said I. ilia; 'Why not now?" the maiden aunt. 
'Why not a summer's as a winter's tale? 



A tale for summer as befits the time, 

And something it should be to suit the place, 

Heroic, for a hero lies beneath, 

Grave, solemn !' 

Waller warp'd his mouth at this 
To something so mock-solemn, that I laugh'd, 
And I, ilia woke with sudden-shrilling mirth 
An echo like a ghostly woodpecker 

Hid in the ruins: till the maiden aunt — 
A little sense of wrong had touch'd 

her face 
With color— turn'd to me with 'As you will; 
Heroic if you will, or what you will. 
Or be yourself your hero if you will.' 

'Take Lilia, then, for heroine." clamor'd he. 
'And make her some great princess, six feet 

high. 
Grand, epic, homicidal: and be you 
The prince to win her!' 

'Then follow me, the prince,' 
I answered, 'each be hero in his turn! 
Seven and yet one, like shadows in a dream. — 
Heroic seems our princess as required — 
But something made to suit with time and 

place, 
A Gothic ruin and a Grecian house. 
A talk of college and of ladies' rights, 
A feudal knight in silken masquerade. 
And. yonder, shrieks and strange experiments 
For which the good Sir Ralph had burnt them 

all— 
This were a medley! we should have him back 
Who told the "Winter's Tale" to do it for us. 
Xo matter; we will say whatever comes. 
And let the ladies sing us. if they will. 
From time to time, some ballad or a song 
To give us breathing-space.' 

So I began. 
And the rest follow'd : and the women sang 
Between the rougher voices of the men. 
Like linnets in the pauses of the wind: 
And here I give the storv and the songs. 



PART ONE 




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PART 

A Prince I was, blue-eyed, and fair in face, 
Of temper amorous as the first of May, 
With lengths of yellow ringlet, like a girl, 

For nil my cradle shone the Northern -.tar. 

There lived an ancienl legend in our house. 
Some sorcerer, whom a far-off grandsire burnl 
Because he cast no shadow, had foretold, 
Dying, that none of all our blood should know 
The shadow from the substance, and that one 

Should come to fight with shadows and to 

fall; 
For so, my mother said, the story ran. 
And, truly, waking dreams were, more or less, 
An old and strangi affection of the house. 
Myself too had weird seizures, Heaven knows 

what! 
On a sudden in the midst of men and day, 
And while I walk'd and talk'd as heretofore, 
I seem'd to move among a world of ghosts, 

And feel myself the shadow of a dream. 
Our great court-Galen poised hi- gilt-head 
cane. 




ONE 

And paw'd his heard, and imilhr'd 'catah ps\.' 
My mother pitying made a thousand prayers. 
My mother was as mild as ::u_\ saint, 
Half-canonized by all that look'd on her. 
So gracious was her tact and tenderness; 
But my good father thought a king a 

king- 
He cared not for the affection of the house; 
lie held his sceptre like a pendant's wand 
To lash offence, end with long arms and hands 
Reach'd out and pick'd offenders from the 

mass 
For judgment. 

Now it chanced that I had bi 

While life "a-- yet in hud and blade, InlrothM 
To one, a neighboring Princess. She to me 
Was prow wedded with a bootless calf 
At eight years old: and --till from time to time 
Came murmurs of her beauty from the South. 
And of her brethren, youths of puissance; 
And still I wore her picture by my heart, 
And one dark tress; and all around them 
both 



THE PRINCESS 




Sweet thoughts would swarm as bees about 
their queen. 

But when the days drew nigh that I should 

wed, 
My father .sent ambassadors with furs 
And jewels, gifts, to fetch her. These brought 

back 
A present, a great labor of the loom ; 
And therewithal an answer vague as wind. 
Besides, they saw the king; he took the gifts; 
He said there was a compact ; that was true ; 
But then she had a will; was he to blame? 
And maiden fancies ; loved to live alone 
Among her women ; certain, would not wed. 

That morning in the presence room I stood 
With Cyril and with Florian, my two friends: 
The first a gentleman of broken means — 
His father's fault — but given to starts and 

bursts 
Of revel; and the last, my other heart, 
And almost my half-self, for still we moved 
Together, twinn'd as horse's ear and eye. 

Now, while they spake, I saw my father's 

face 
Grow long and troubled like a rising moon, 
Inflamed with wrath. He started on his feet, 
Tore the king's letter, snow'd it down, and 

rent 
The wonder of the loom thro' warp and woof 
From skirt to skirt ; and at the last he sware 
That he would send a hundred thousand men, 
And bring her in a whirlwind; then he chew'd 
The thrice-turn'd cud of wrath, and cook'd 

his spleen, 
Communing with his captains of the war. 

At last I spoke: 'My father, let me go. 
It cannot be but some gross error lies 
In this report, this answer of a king 
Whom all men rate as kind and hospitable; 
Or, maybe, I myself, my bride once seen, 



Whate'er my grief to find her less than fame, 
May rue the bargain made.' And Florian 

said : 
'I have a sister at the foreign court, 
Who moves about the Princess; she, you 

know. 
Who wedded with a nobleman from thence. 
He, dying lately, left her, as I hear, 
The lady of three castles in that land; 
Thro' her this matter might be sifted clean.' 
And Cyril, whisper'd : "Take me with you too.' 
Then laughing, 'What if these weird seizures 

come 
Upon you in those lands, and no one near 
To point you out the shadow from the truth! 
Take me; I'll serve you better in a strait; 
I grate on rusty hinges here.' But 'No !' 
Roar'd the rough king, 'you shall not ; we 

ourself 
Will crush her pretty maiden fancies dead 
In iron gauntlets ; break the council up.' 

But when the council broke, I rose and past 
Thro' the wild woods that hung about the 

town ; 
Found a still place, and pluck'd her likeness 

out ; 
Laid it on flowers, and watch'd it lying 

bathed 
In the green gleam of dewy-tassell'd trees. 
What were those fancies? wherefore break her 

troth? 
Proud look'd the lips ; but while I meditated 
A wind arose and rush'd upon the South, 
And shook the songs, the whispers, and the 

shrieks 
Of the wild woods together, and a Voice 
Went with it, "Follow, follow, thou shalt win.' 

Then, ere the silver sickle of that month 
Became her golden shield. I stole from court 
With Cyril and with Florian, unperceived, 
Cat-footed thro' the town and half in dread 
To hear mv father's clamor at our backs 




afc: 



A MEDLEY 



With 'Ho!' from some bay-window shake the 

night; 
Hut all was quiet. From the bastion'd walls 
Like threaded spiders, one by one, we diropt, 
Ami flying reach'd the frontier; then we crost 
To a livelier land; and so by liltli and grange, 
And vims, and blowing bosks of wilderness, 
We gain'd the mother-city thick with towers, 
And in the imperial palace found the kinj^. 



His name was (Jama: crack'd and si 



his 



Hut bland the smile that like a wrinkling wind 
On glass; water drove his cheek in lines; 
A little drv old man, without a star. 
Not like a king. Three days he feasted us. 
And on the fourth I spake of wliv we came, 
And in}' betroth'd. 'You do us. Prince,' lie 

said. 

Airing a snowy hand and signet gem, 
'All honor. We remember love ourself 
In our sweel youth. There did a compact 

pass 
Long summers back, a kind of ceremony — 
I think tlu year in which our olives fail'd. 
I would you had her. I'rince. with all my 

heart. 
With my full heart; hut there were widows 

here. 

Two uido»s. Lady Psyche, Lady Blanche; 

They fed her theories, in and out of plan 
Maintaining that with equal husbandry 
The woman Wen an equal to the man. 

They harp'd on this; with this our banquets 

rang; 
Our dances broke and buzz'd in knots of talk; 
Nothing lint this; m\ very ears "ere hot 
To heai- them. Knowledge, so my daughter 

held. 

Was all in all ; they had hut been, she thought. 
As children; they must lose the child, assume 
The woman. Then, sir, awful odes she wrote, 
Too awful, sure, for what they treated of. 
Hut all she is and does i> awful: odes 



About this losing of the child; and rhymes 
And dismal lyrics, prophesying chain 
Beyond all reason. These the women sang; 
And they that know such things — I sought 

hut peace; 
No cntic I — would call tin in masterpieces. 
TIm v master'd me. At last sin begg'd a boon, 
A certain summer palace which I have 
Hard by \k\[v father's frontier. I said no, 
Yet being an easy man, gave it : and thi n . 
All wild to found an University 
For maidens, on the spur she fled; and more 
We knew not,-- only this: they see no men, %». ..„ 

Not evi n her brother Arac, nor the twins 
Her brethren, tho' they love her, look upon j/ 

her 
As on a kind of paragon; and I— 
Pardon me saving it wire much loth to breed 
Dispute betwixt myself and mine; but since 
And I confess with right y on think me hound 
In some sort, I can give you letters to her; 
And yet, to speak the truth, I rate your 

chance 
Almost at naked nothing.' 

Thus the king; 
And I. tho' nettled that he seem'd to slur 

With garrulous case and oily courtesies 
Our formal compact, yet. not less- all frets 
Hut dialing nu on tire to rind my bridi 
Went forth again with hoth my friends. 

We rode 
Many a long league hack to the North. 

At last 
From hills that look'd across a land ni' hopi 
We drop! w ith evening on .1 rustic town 
Sit in a gleaming river's cresceni curve, 
Clos, at the boundary of the liberties; 
Then, enter'd an old hostel, call'd mine host 
'l'o council, plied him with his richest wines, 
And show'd tin late writ letters of the king. 

II. with a long low sibilation, stared 
As blank as death in marble; then exclaim'd, 
Averring it was clear against all rules 



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THE PRINCESS 










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For any man to go; hut as his brain 
Began to mellow, 'If the ki nj4,." he said, 
'Had given us letters, was he bound to speak? 
The king would hear him out;' and at tin 

last 
Tlic summer of the vine in all his veins — 
'No dcubl that we might make it worth his 

while. 

She oner had past that way; he heard her 

speak : 
She scared him; life! he never saw the like; 
Sin look'd as grand as doomsday and as 

-rave ! 
And he, he reverenced his liege lady there; 
lie always made a point to post with mares; 
His daughter and his housemaid were the 

ho\ s ; 
The land, he understood. Cor miles about 
Was till'd by women; all the swine were sows, 
Aial all the dogs' — 

Hut while he jested thus, 
A thought flash'd thro* me which I clothed in 

act. 
Remembering how we three presented Maid. 
Or Nymph, or Goddess, at high tide of feast. 
In masque or pageant at my father's court. 
We sent mine host [a purchase female gear; 
He brought it. and 1. .nself. a sight to shake 
Tin' midriff of despair with laughter, holp 
To lace us up. till each in maiden plumes 
We rustled : him we gave a costly bribe 
To guerdon sdence, mounted our good steeds. 
And boldly ventured on the liberties. 

We follow \1 up the river as we rode, 
And rode till midnight, when the college lights 
Began to glister firefly-like in copse 
And linden alley; then we past an arch, 
Whereon a woman-statue rose with wings 
From four-wing'd horses dark against the 

stars. 
And some inscription ran along the front. 
Hut deep in shadow. Further on we gain'd 
A little street half garden and half house, 



Hut scarce could hear each, other speak for 

noise 
Of clocks and chimes, like silver hammers 

falling 
On silver anvils, and the splash and stir 
Of fountains spouted up and showering down 
111 meshes of the jasmine and the rose: 
And all about us peal'd the nightingale, 
Rapt in her song and careless of the snare. 

There stood a bust of Pallas for a sign, 
By two sphere lamps blazon'd like Heaven and 
Earth 

With constellation and with continent. 
Above an entry. Riding in. we call'd; 
A plump-arniM ostleress and a stable wench 
Came running al the call, and help'd us down. 
Then step! a buxom hostess forth, and sail'd, 
Pull-blown, before us into rooms which gave 
Upon a pillar'd porch, the liases lost 
In laurel. Her we ask'd of that and this. 
And who were tutors. 'Lady Blanche,' she 

said, 
•And Lady Psyche.' 'Which was prettiest. 
Hist natured?' 'Lady Psyche.' 'Hers are 

we,' 
One voice, we cried; and I sat down and wrote 
In such a hand as when a Held of corn 
Hows all its ears before the roaring Fast: 

'Three ladies of the Northern empire pray 
Your Highness would enroll them with your 

own, 
As Lady Psyche's pupils.' 

This I seal'd; 
The seal was Cupid bent above a scroll. 
And o'er his head Iranian \ enus hung, 
And raised the blinding bandage from his 

eves. 
I gave the letter to he sent with dawn; 
And then to bed. where half in doze I seem'd 
To float about a glimmering night, and watch 
A full sea glazed with muffled moonlight swell 
On some dark shore just seen that it was rich. 



SONG 



As thro* Hip land at eve we went, 
And pluck'd the ripen'd ears, 



As thro' the land at eve we went, 

Ami pluck'd the ripen'd ears. 
We fell out, my wife and I. 
0, we fell out, I know not why. 

And kiss'd again with tears. 
And blessings on the falling out 

That all the move endears, 
Whan we fall out with those we love 

And kiss again with tears! 
For when we came where lies the child 

We lost in other years, 
There above the little grave, 
O, there above the little grave, 

We kiss'd again with tears. 







H«»" 



P A R_T TWO 




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PART TWO 



At break of day the College Portress came; 

Sin broughl us academic silks, in hue 

The lilac, with a .silkm hood to each, 

And zoned with gold; and now when thesi 

were on, 
And we as rich as moths from dusk cocoons, 
She curtseying her obeisance, let us know 
The Princess [da waited. Out we paced, 
I first, and following thro' the porch that 

sang 
All round with laurel, issued in a court 
Compact (it lucid marbles, boss'd with lengths 
Of elassi,- frieze, with ample awnings gay 
Betwixt the pillars, and with great urns of 

flowi rs. 
The Muses and the Graces, group'd in threes, 
Enring'd a billowing fountain in the midst, 
And here and then on lattice edges lay 
Or hook or lute; but hastily we past. 
And up a flight of .stairs into the hall. 



There at a hoard by tome and paper ^at. 
With two tame leopards couch'd beside her 

thr 

All beauty compass'd in a female form, 
The Princess; liker to the inhabitant 
Of some clear planet close upon the sun. 
Than our man's earth: such eyes were in her 

head, 
And so much graci and power, breathing 

down 
From over her arch'd brows, with everj turn 
Lived thro' her to the tips of her long hands. 
And to hi i fi et. She rose her hi ight, and 

said : 

'We give you welcome; not without redound 
Of use and glory to yourselves yi come, 
The first-fruits of the stranger; after) 
And that full voice which circles round the 
gravi . 



THE PRINCESS 



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Will rank you nobly, mingled up with me. 
What! arc tin ladies of your land so tall?' 
'We of the court." said Cyril. 'From the 

court," 
She answered, "then ye know the Prince?' and 

lie: 

'The climax of his age! as tho' there were 
- 
iXKi^T *''"-' rose in !l 'l the world, your Highness that. 

He worships your ideal.' She replied: 

'We scarcely thought in our own hall to hear 

This barren verbiage, current among men, 

Light coin, the tinsel clink of compliment. 

Your flight from out your bookless wilds 

would seem 
As arguing love of knowledge and of power; 
Your language proves you still the child. 

Indeed, 
We dream not of him ; when we set our hand 
To this great work, we purposed with ourself 
Never to wed. You likewise will do well, 
Ladies, in entering here, to cast and fling 
The tricks which make us toys of men, that so 
Some future time, if so indeed you will. 
You may with those self-styled our lords ally 
Your fortunes, justlier balanced, scale with 

scale." 

At those high words, we, conscious of our- 
selves, 
Perused the matting; then an officer 
Rose up, and read the statutes, such as these: 
Not for three years to correspond with home; 
Not for three years to cross the liberties ; 
Not for three years to speak with any men ; 
And many more, which hastily subscribed. 
We enter'd on the boards. And 'Now,' she 

cried, 
'Ye are green wood, see ye warp not. Look, 

our hall! 
Our statues ! — not of those that men desire, 
Sleek Odalisques, or oracles of mode, 
Nor stunted squaws of West or East ; but she 
That taught the Sabine how to rule, and she 
The foundress of the Babylonian wall, 



The Carian Artemisia strong in war, 
The Rhodope that built the pyramid, 
Clelia, Cornelia, with the Pahnyrene 

That fought Aurelian, and the Roman brows 
Of Agrippina. Dwell with these, and lose 
Convention, since to look on noble forms 
.Makes noble thro' the sensuous organism 
That which is higher. O, lift your natures up; 
Embrace our aims; work out your freedom. 

Girls, 
Knowledge is now no more a fountain seal'd ! 
Drink deep, until the habits of the slave, 
The sins of emptiness, gossip and spite, 
And slander, die. Better not be at all 
Than not he noble. Leave us; you may go. 
To-day the Lady Psyche will harangue 
The fresh arrivals of the week before; 
For they press in from all the provinces, 
And fill the hive." 

She spoke, and bowing waved 
Dismissal; back again we crost the court 
To Lady Psyche's. As we enter'd in, 
There sat along the forms, like morning doves 
That sun their milky bosoms on the thatch, 
A patient range of pupils; she herself 
Erect behind a desk of satin-wood, 
A quick brunette, well-moulded, falcon-eyed, 
And on the hither side, or so she look'd. 
Of twenty summers. At her left a child, 
In shining draperies, headed like a star, 
Her maiden babe, a double April old, 
Aglai'a slept. We sat: the lady glanced; 
Then Florian, but no livelier than the dame 
That whisper'd 'Asses' ears' among the sedge, 
'My sister." 'Comely, too, by all that's fair,' 
Said Cyril. 'O, hush, hush!' and she began. 

'This world was once a fluid haze of light, 
Till toward the centre set the starry tides, 
And eddied into suns, that wheeling cast 
The planets; then the monster, then the man; 
Tattoo'd or woaded, winter-clad in skins. 
Raw from the prime, and crushing down his 
mate. 



A MEDLEY 



As yet we find in barbarous isles, and here 
Among the lowest.' 

Tllcrelip. II she took 

A bird's-eye view of all the ungracious past; 
Glanced at the legendary Amazon 
As emblematic of a oobler age; 
Appraised the Lycian custom, spoke of those 
That lay at wine with Lar and Lucumo; 
Ran down the Persian, Grecian, Roman lines 
Of empire, and the woman's state in each, 
How far from just; till warming with her 

theme 
She fulmined out her scorn of laws Salique 

And little-footed China, touch'd on .Mahomet 
With much contempt, and came to chivalry, 
When some respect, however slight, was paid 
To woman, superstition all awry. 
However, then commenced the dawn: a beam 
Had slanted forward, falling in a land 
Of promise: fruit would follow. Deep, indeed, 
Their debt of thanks to her who first had 

dared 
To leap tlie rotten pales of prejudice, 
Disyoke their necks from custom, and assert 
None lordlier than themselves hut that which 

made 
Woman and man. She had founded; they 

must build. 
Here might they learn whatever men were 

taught. 

Let them not fear, some said their luad- were 

less ; 
Some men's wire small, not tin v the least of 

men : 
For often fineness compensated size. 
Besides the brain was like the hand, and grew 
With using; thence the man's, if more was 

more. 
lie took advantage of his strength to he 
First in lh. field: some ages had been l"st : 
Hut woman ripen'd earlier, and her life 
Was longer; and albeit their glorious nanus 
Wen fewer, SCatter'd stars, yet since in truth 
The highest is tin- measure of tie man, 



And not the Kaffir, Hottentot, .Malay. 

Nor tlio.se horn handed breakers of the glebe, 

Hut Homer. Plato, Verulam, even so 

With woman: and in arts of government 
Elizabeth and others, arts of war 
The peasant Joan and others, arts of graci 
Sappho and others vied with any man: 
And. last not least, she who had left her place, 
And bow'd her state to them, that they might 

grow 
To use and power on this oasis, lapt 
In the arms of leisure, .sacred from the blight 
Of ancient influence and scorn. 

At last 
She rose upon a wind of prophecy 
Dilating on the future: 'everywhen 
Two heads in council, two beside the hearth, 
Two in the tangled business of the world. 
Two in the liberal offices id' life. 

Two plummets dropt from one to sound the 
abyss 

Of science and the secrets of the mind: 
Musician, painter, sculptor, critic, mori : 
And everywhere the broad and bounteous 

Earth 
Should hear a double growth of thus, rare 

souls, 

PoetS, whose thoughts enrich the blood of the 
world." 

She ended here, and hcckouM us: tin rest 

Parted; and. glowing full faced welcome, she 

Began to address us. and was moving on 
In oral ulation. till as when a boat 
Tacks and tin slacken*.! sail flaps, all her voice 
Faltering anil fluttering in her throat, she 
cried. 

'My brother!" 'Well, my sister.' *<>." she 

said. 
'What do Mill Inn.- and in this dr. SS? and 

this, ? 

Why, who an- this,' a wolf within the fold! 

A pack of wolves ! th, Lord be gracious to 



flfe 

Si 



'• 



*-; 






I v, 










' t V 



THE PRIN CESS 



■ 




A plot, a plot, a plot, to ruin all !' 

'No plot, no plot,' lie answered. 'Wretched 

boy, 
How saw you not the inscription on the gate, 
Let xo max enteb ix on pain of death?' 
'And it' I had,' he answer'd, "Who could think 
The softer Adams of your Academe, 
() sister, Sirens tho' they be, were such 
As ehanled (in the blanching bones of men?' 
'Hut you will find it otherwise," she said. 
'You .jest: ill jesting with edge-tools! my vow 
Hinds me to speak, and () that iron will. 
That axelike edge unVinable, our Head. 
The Princess!' 'Well then. Psyche, take my 

life. 
And nail me like a weasel on a grange 
For warning; bury me beside the gate, 
And cut this epitaph above my bones: 
Here lies a brother by n sister slain, 
All for the common good of womankind, .' 
'Let me die too," said Cyril, 'having seen 
And heard the Lady Psyche.' 

I struck in : 
'Albeit so niask'd. madam, I love the truth: 
Receive it, and in me behold the Prince 
Your countryman, affianced years ago 
To the Lady Ida. Here, for here she was. 
And thus — what other way was left? — I 

came.' 
'() sir, O Prince. I have no country, none : 
If any, this; but none. Whate'er I was 
Disrooted, what I am is grafted here. 
Affianced, sir? love-whispers may not breathe 
Within this vestal limit, and how should I. 
Who am not mine, say, live? The thunderbolt 
Hangs silent : but prepare. I speg.k, it falls.' 
'Yet pause," I said: 'for that inscription there, 
I think no more of deadly lurks therein. 
Than in a clapper clapping in a garth. 
To scar-' the fowl from fruit: if more there 

be. 
If more and acted on, what follows? war: 
Your own work niarr'd; for this your 

Academe, 



Whichever side be victor, in the halloo 

Will topple to the trumpet down, and pass 
With all fair theories only made to gild 
A stonnless summer.' 'Let the Princess judge 
Of that." she said: 'farewell, sir — and to you. 

I shudder at the sequel, but I go.' 

'Are you that Lady Psyche,' I rejoin'd, 
'The fifth in line from that old Florian. 
Yet hangs his portrait in my father's hall— 
The gaunt old baron witli bis beetle brow 
Sun-shaded in the heat of dusty fights— 
As he bestrode my grandsire, when he fell. 
And all else fled? we point to it, and we say. 
The loyal warmth of Florian is not cold. 
But branches current yet in kindred veins.' 
'Are you that Psyche,' Florian added: 'she 
With whom I sang about the morning hills, 
Flung ball, flew kite, and raced the purple fly. 
And snared the squirrel of the glen? are you 
That Psyche, wont to bind my throbbing 

brow. 
To smooth my pillow, mix the foaming 

draught 
Of fever, tell me pleasant tales, and read 
My sickness down to happy dreams? are you 
That brother-sister Psyche, both in one? 
You were that Psyche, but what arc 

you now?' 
'You are that Psyche,' Cyril said, 'for whom 
I would be that forever which I seem, 
Woman, if I might sit beside your feet, 
And glean your scattcr'd sapience.' 

Then once more, 
'Are you that Lady Psyche." I began, 
'That on her bridal morn before she past 
From all her old companions, when the king 
Kiss'd her pale cheek, declared that ancient 

tics 
Would still be dear beyond the southern hills; 
That were there any of our people there 
In want or peril, there was one to hear 
And help them? look! for such are these and 



A M EDLEY 



'Aw you that Psyche,' Florian ask'd, 'to 

whom. 
In gentler days, your arrow-wounded fawn 
Came flying while you sat beside the well? 
The creature laid his muzzle <m your lap 
And sobb'd) and you sobb'd with it, and the 

blood 
Was sprinkled on your kirtle, and you wept. 
That was fawn's blood, not brother's, yet you 

wept. 
(), by the bright head of my little niece, 
You were that Psyche, and what are you 

now ?' 
'You were that Psyche,' Cyril said again, 
'The mother of the sweetest little maid 
Thai ever crow'd for kisses.' 

'( )ut upon it !' 
She answer'd, 'peace! and why should I not 

play 
The Spartan Mother with emotion, he 
The Lucius Junius Brutus of my kind.-' 
Him you call great; he for the common weal, 
The fading politics of mortal Home, 
As I might slay this child, if good 

need were. 
Slew both hi- sons; and I, shall I, on whom 
The secular emancipation turns 
Of halt' this world, he swerved from ri <j;Iit to 

save 
A prince, a brother.' a little will I yield. 
Rest BO) perchance, for us, and well for you. 
(), hard when love and duty clash! I fear 
My conscience will not count me fleckless; 

yet — 
Hear my conditions: promise — otherwise 
You perish — as you came, to .slip away 
To-day, to-morrow, soon. It -hall he -aid, 
These women were too barbarous, would not 

learn ; 
They fled, who might have shamed us. 

Promise, all.' 

What could we else, we promised each: and 
she, 



Like some wild creature newly-caged, com- 
menced 
A to-and-fro, so pacing till she paused 
H\ Florian; holding out her lily arms 
Took both his hands, and smiling faintly 

-aid : 
'I knew you at the first; tlio" you have grown 
You scarce have alter'd. I am -ad and glad 
To see Mai, Florian. / give thee to death, 

My brother! it was duty spoke, not I. 
My needful seeming harshness, pardon it. 
Our mother, is she well?' 

With that -he kiss'd 
Hi- forehead, then, a moment after, clung 
About him, and betwixt then, blossom'd up 
From out a common vein of memory 
Sweet household talk, and phrases of the 

hearth, 
And far allusion, till the gracious dews 
Be&ran to glisten and to fall; and wlule 
They stood, so rapt, we gazing, came a voice, 

*I brought a message In re from Lady 

Blanche.' 
Hack started she, and turning round We saw 

Tlie Lady Blanche's daughter where she stood, 
Melissa, with her hand upon the lock, 
A rosy blonde, and in a college gown, 
That clad her like an April daffodilly — 
Her mother's color — with her lips apart, 
And all her thoughts as fair within her eyes, 
As bottom agates seen to wave and float 
In crystal currents of clear morning seas. 

So stootl thai same fair creature at the 
door. 
Then Lady Psyche, 'Ah — Melissa — you ! 

You heard US?' and Melissa, 'O, pardon mi ! 
I heard. I could not help it. did not wish; 
Hut. dearesl lady, praj you fear me not, 
Nor think I bear that heart within m\ breast, 
To give three gallant gentlemen to death.' 

'I trust you.' .-aid the other, 'for we !«" 
Wire always friend-, none closer, elm and 
vine; 





. 



THE PRINCESS 




s> .1^ 









Itut vil your mother's jealous temperament — 
Lei not your prudence, dearest, drowse, or 

prove 
The Danaid of a leaky vase, for fear 
This whole foundation ruin, and I lose 
My honor, these their lives.' 'Ah, fear me 

oot,' 
Replied Melissa; 'no I would no! It'll, 
No, nut for all Aspasia's cleverness, 
No, not In answer, madam, .'ill those hard 

things 
Thai Sluli.'i came to ask of Solomon. 
'Be il so,' llu' other, 'thai we still may lead 
The new lighl up, and culminate in peace, 
For Solomon may come to Sheba yet.' 
Said Cyril, 'Madam, he the wisesi man 
Feasted the woman wisesl then, in halls 
Of Lebanonian cedar; nor should you 
Tho', madam, you should answer, we would 

ask — 
Less welcome find among us, if you came 
Among us, debtors for our lives to you, 
MvmU for something more. 1 He said not 

what, 
Bui 'Thanks,' she answer'd, 'go; we have 

been too long 
Together; keep your hoods about the face; 
They do so thai affeci abstraction here. 
Speak lillli'; mis noi with the rest; and hold 
Your promise. All, I trust, may yei be well.' 

^\'f turn'd to go, bui Cyril took the child, 
And held her round the knees against his 

waist, 
And blew the swollen cheek of a trumpeter, 
While Psyche watch'd them, smiling, and the 

child 
Push'd her flai hand agoinsi his face and 

laugh'd; 
And thus our conference closed. 

And then we strolled 
For half the day thro" stately theatres 
Bench'd crescent-wise. In each we sat. we 

hoard 



The grave professor. On the lecture ■date 
The circle rounded under female hands 
Willi flawless demonstration; follow'd then 
A classic lecture, rich in sentiment, 
Willi scraps of thunderous epic lilted out 
By violei hooded Doctors, elegies 
Ami quoted odes, and jewels five-words-long 
Thai mi the stretch'd forefinger of all Time 
Sparkle forever. Then we dipt in all 
'That treats of whatsoever is, the state, 
The total chronicles of man. the mind. 
The morals, something of the frame, the rock, 
The star, the bird, the fish, the shell, the 

flower, 
Electric, chemic laws, and all the rest, 
And whatsoever can be taught and known; 
Till liki' three horses thai have broken fence, 
And glutted all night long breast-deep in 

corn, 
We issued gorged with knowledge, and I 

spoke : 
'Why, Mrs. they tin all this as well as we.' 

'They hunt old trails,' said Cyril, 'very well; 
Bui «hen did woman ever vet invent?' 
'Ungracious!' answer'd Florian; 'have you 

Kamt 
No more from Psyche's lecture, vou that 

talk'd 

The trash that made me siek, anil almost sad?' 
'(), trash," he said, 'but with a kernel in it! 
Should I not call her wise who made me 

w ise? 

And learnt? I learnt more from her in n 

flash 
'Than if my brainpan were an empty hull. 
And every .Muse lumhlid a science in. 
A thousand hearts lie fallow in these halls. 
And round these halls a thousand baby loves 
Fly twanging headless arrows at the hearts, 
Whence follows many a vacanl pang; 

bui 0, 

With me, sir, enter'd in the bigger hoy, 
'The head of all lie golden shafted firm, 
The long-limb'd lad that had a Psvche too; 



A M ED LEY 



He cli t'l me thro' the stomacher. Ami now 
What think you of it. Florian? da I chase 
The substance or t lie* shadow P will it hold? 
I have no sorcerer's malison on me, 
No ghostly hauntings like his Highness. I 
Flatter myself that always everywhere 
I know the substance when I see it. Well, 
Are castles shadows.' Three of them? 

Is she 
The sweet proprietress a shadow? It' not, 
Shall those three castles patch my tatter'd 

coat ? 
For dear arc those three castles to my wants, 
And deai' is sister Psyche to my heart. 
And two dear things are one of double worth; 
And much I might have said, hut that my 

zone 
Unmann'd me. Then the Doctors! O, to hear 
The Doctors! O, to watch the thirsty plants 
Imbibing! once or twice I thought to roar. 
To break my chain, to shake my mane; hut 

thou, 
Modulate me, soul of mincing mimicry! 
Make liquid treble of that bassoon, my throat : 

Abase those eves that ever loved to meet 
Star-sisters answering under crescent hrows ; 
Abate the stride which speaks o\' man, and 

loose 
A Hying charm of blushes o'er this cheek, 
Where they like swallows coming out of time 
Will wonder why they came. But bark the 

bell 
For dinner, let us go!' 

And in we stream'd 
Among the columns, pacing staid and still 
ll\ twos and threes, till all from end to end 

With beauties every shade of brown and fair 

In colors gayer than the morning mist. 
The lung hall glitter'd like a bed of flowers. 
How might a man not wander from his wits 
Pierced thro' with eyes, but that I kept mine 

own 
Intent on her, who rapt in glorious dreams, 
'Phe second-sight of sum, Astraean age. 



Sat compass'd with professors; they, the 

while, 
Discuss'd a doubt and tost it to and fro. 
A clamor thieken'd, niixt with inmost terms 
Of art and science: Lady Blanche alone 
Of faded form and haughtiest lineaments. 
With all her autumn tresses falsely l)rown, 

Shot sidelong daggers at us, a tiger-cat 
In act to spring. 

At last a solemn grace 
Concluded, and we sought the gardens. There 
One walk'd reciting by herself, and one 
In this hand held a volume as to read. 
And smoothed a petted peacock down with 
that. 

Sonic to a low song oar'd a shallop by, 
Or under arches of the marble bridge 
Hung, shadow'd from the heat; some hid and 

sought 
In the orange thickets; others tost a hall 
Above the fountain-jets, and hack again 
With laughter: others lay about the lawns. 
Of the older sort, and liuirmur'd that their 

.May 
Was passing- what was learning unto them? 
They wish'd to marry: they could rule a 

house; 
Men hated learned women. But we three 
Sat muffled like the Fates: and often came 
Melissa hitting all we saw with shafts 
Of gentle satire, kin to charity. 
That harm'd not. Then day droopt ; the 

chapel lulu 
Call'd us: wc left the walks: we mixt with 

those 
Six hundred maidens clad in purest white. 

Before two streams of light from wall to wall. 
While the great organ almost hurst his pip'-. 
Groaning for power, and rolling thro* the 

court 
A long melodious thunder to the sound 

Of solemn psalms and silver litanies. 

The work of Ida. to call down from heaven 

A blessing on her labors for the world. 














. 




■ .14 ' i * 
















— h 



V 



SONG 



S«i ■ t and I"" . Bwe< t and low, 
Wind nt' tin wi stem 



Sweet and low, sweet and low. 

Wind of the western sea, 
Low, low, breathe and blow, 

Wind of the western sea ! 
Over the rolling waters go, 
Come from the dying moon, and blow, 

Blow him again to me; 
While my little one, while my pretty one 
sleeps. 

Sleep and rest, sleep and rest, 

Father will come to thee soon ; 
Rest, rest, on mother's breast, 

Father will come to thee soon ; 
Father will come to his babe in the nest, 
Silver sails all out of the west 

Under the silver moon ; 
Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, 
sleep. 



P A RT T H REE 







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■. 



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Jz~^*- 



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'55 










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>-■•■ y 



Moen in the white wake of the morning star 
( lame furrowing all the orient into gold. 
We rose, and each by other drest with care 
Descended to the court that lay three parts 
In shadow, but the .Muses' heads were touch'd 
Above the darkness from their native East. 

There while we stood beside the fount, and 
watch'd 
Or seem'd to watch the dancing bubble, ap- 

proach'd 
Melissa, tinged with wan from lack of sleep, 
Or grief, and glowing round her dewj eyes 

The circled I li.- of a niglll of teal's ; 

And 'Fly,' she cried. •() fly, while yet you 

may ! 
My mother know-.* And when I ask'd her 

•how; 

•My fault,' she wept, 'my fault! and yet not 

mine ; 




m 



m 






m 

"ft 



■ 

. ■ 



"*- 



--. 



P A RT T H REE 



Yet mine in part. 0, hear me. pardon me! 
My mother, 't is her wont from [right to night 
To rail at Lady Psyche and her side. 
She says the Princess should have been the 

Head, 
Hi i'm If and Lady Psyche the two amis, 
And so it was agreed when first thej came; 
Hut Lady Psyche was the righl hand now, 
And she the left, or not or seldom used: 
Hers more than half the student-, all the love. 
And so last night -he fell to canvass you, 
Her countrywomen! she did not envy her. 
■"Who ever >a» such wild barbarians? 
Girls? more like nun'" and at these words 

the .-nake. 

My secret, seem'd to stir within my breast; 
And ( •. sirs, could I help it, but my cheek 
Began to burn and burn, and her lynx 

To li\ and make me hotter, till -he laugh'd: 
'•() marvellously modest maiden, you! 



THE PRINCESS 






* 



- 




Men! girls, like men! why, it' they had been 

nun 
You nuil not set your thoughts in rubric thus 
For wholesale comment." Pardon, I am 

shamed 
That I must needs repeat for my excuse 
What looks .so little graceful: '•men" — for 

still 
My mother went revolving on the word — 
"Anil so they are. — very like men indeed — 
And with that woman - I for hours!" 
Then came these dreadful words out one by 

one. 
"Why — these — tirr — men :" I shudderM : 

"and you know it :" 
"O, a-k me nothing," I said. "And she knows 

too, 
And she conceals it." So my mother clutch'd 
The truth at once, but with no word from me; 
Ami now thus earlv risen she goes to inform 
The Princess. Lady Psyche will be crush'd; 
Hut you may yet be saved, and therefore tly : 
But heed me with your pardon ere you go.' 

'What pardon, sweet Melissa, for a blush:' 
Said Cyril; 'Pale one. blush again; than wear 
Those lilies, better blush our lives away. 
Yet let us breathe for one hour more in 

heaven." 
He added, 'lest some classic angel speak 
In scorn of us. "They mounted, Ganymedes, 
To tumble. Vulcan*, on the second morn." 
But I will melt this marble into wax 
To yield us farther furlough ;' and he went. 

Melissa shook her doubtful curls, and 
thought 
11 si irci would prosper. 'Tell us,' Plorian 
ask'd, 

'How grew this feud betwixt the right and 

ft.' 
'O. long ago.' she said, "betwixt these two 
D sion smoulders hidden; "t is my mother. 
Too jealous, often fretful a.s the wind 



l\nt in a crevice: much I bear with her. 
I never knew my father, but she says — 

tied help her! — she was wedded to a fool; 
And still she rail'd against the state of things. 
She had the care o( Lady Ida*- youth, 
And from the Queen's decease she brought her 

up. 
But when your >i>ter came -he won the heart 
Of Ida: thev were still together, strew — 
For so they -aid themselves — inosculated; 
Consonant chords that shiver to one note; 
One mind in all things. Yet my mother still 
Affirms your Psyche thieved her theories, 
Ami angled with them for her pupil's love; 
She calls her plagiarist. I know not what. 
But I must go; 1 dare not tarry," and light, 
As flies the shallow oi' a bird, she tied. 

Then murmur'd Florian, gazing after her: 
"An open-hearted maiden, true and pure. 
If I could love, why this were she. How pretty 
Her blushing was, and how she blush'd 

again. 
As if to close with Cyril's random wish! 
Not like your Princess eramm'd with erring 

pride. 
Nor like poor Psyche whom she drags in tow.' 

"The crane.* I said, "may chatter of the 

crane. 
The dove may murmur o( the dove, but I 
An eagle clang an eagle to the sphere. 
My princess, O my prim-ess! true she errs. 
But in her own strand way; Ixiiiir herself 
Three times more noble than three score of 

men. 
She sees her-ilf in every woman else. 
And so she wears her error like a crown 
T blind the truth and me. For her. and 
Hebes are they to hand ambrosia, mix 
The nectar: but — ah. she — whene'er she 

moves 
The Samian Here rises, and she speaks 
A Memmon smitten with the morning sun.' 



A M ED LEY 



Sn Baying from the court we paced, and 

gain'd 
The terrace ranged .- 1 1 1 > n ^ the northern front, 
Ami leaning there on those balusters, high 
Above the empurpled champaign, drank the 

gale 
Thai blown about the foliage underneath. 
And sated with the innumerable rose, 
Heat balm upon our eyelids. Hither came 
Cyril, and yawning, '() hard task, 9 he cried: 
'Nil fighting shadows lure. I forced a way 
Thro' solid opposition crabb'd and gnarl'd. 
Bi llir to clear prime forests, heave and thump 
A league of street in summer solstice down. 
Than hammer at this reverend gentlewoman. 
I knock'd and, bidden, entered; found her 

there 
At point to move, and settled in her eyes 
The green malignant light o( coming storm. 
Sir, I was courteous, every phrase well-oil'd, 
As man's could be; yet maiden-meek I pray'd 
Concealment. She demanded who we were, 
And why we came? 1 fabled nothing fair. 
Hut. your example pilot, told her all. 

I*J) went the hush'd amaze ^i' hand and eve. 

Hut when I dwelt upon your old affiance, 
Sin answered sharply that I talk'd astray. 
I urged the tierce inscription on the gate, 
And our three lives. Tnu — we had limed 

ourselves 
With opi 11 eyes, and we must take the chance. 
Hut such extremes, I told her, well might harm 
Tin' woman's cause. "Not more than now," 

she .said, 
"So puddled as it is with favoritism." 
I tried the mother's heart. Shame might be- 
fall 
Melissa, knowing, saying not she knew; 
Hi r answer was. "Leave me to deal with that." 

I spoke of war to come and manv deaths, 

And she replied, her duty was to speak, 
And duty duty, clear of consequi net s. 
I grew discouraged, -sir: hut since I knew 

No rock so hard hut that a little wave 



.Ma\ heat admission m a thousand years, 

I recommenced: "Decide not ere you pause. 

I find .M'U lure hut in the 1 second place, 

Some say the third- the authenlic foundress 

you. 
I elf. r boldly : we w ill seal you high si . 
Wink al our advent; help mj prince to gain 

1 lis right fill bride, and hen I promise you 
Some palace in our land, where you shall 

rein,. 

The head and heart of all our fair she world, 
And your great name flow on with broadening 
t ime 

For ever." Well, she halanced this a little, 
And told me she would answer us to day. 
Meantime he mute; thus much, nor more I 
gain'd. 9 

lie ceasinff, came a message from the Head. 

rs o 

'That afternoon the Princess rode to take 

The dip of certain strata to the north. 

Would we go with her? we should find the 

land 

Worth seeing, and the river made a fall 

Out yonder;' then she pointed on to where 

A double hill ran up his furrowy forks 

Beyond the thick-leaved platans of the vale. 

Agreed to. this, the day fled on thro' all 

Its range of duties to the appointed hour. 

Then sinnmon'd to the porch we went. She 

stood 
Among her maidens, higher by tile head. 

Her hack against a pillar, her fool on one 

Of those tame leopards. Kitten like he roll'd 
And paw'd about her sandal. I drew mar; 
T gazed. On a sudden my strange seizure 

came 
Upon me. tile Weird vision of our house. 

The Princess Ida seem'd a hollow show. 
Her gay t'urr'd cats a painted fantasy, 
Her college and In r maidens empty masks, 

And I myself tin shadow of a dream. 

For all tinners were and win not. Yi t I felt 




\1«. '. 






; .\\ 



■'■ 









THE PRINCESS 



i * ' 






,-iV' v 




3 ;^i 



I 



My heart beat 1 1 lick with passion and with 

awe ; 
Then from 1113- breast the involuntary sigh 
Brake, as she smote me with the light of eyes 
§} j That lent my knee desire to kneel, and shook 
My pulses, till to horse we got, and so 
Went forth in long retinue following up 
The river as it narrow'd to the hills. 

I rode beside her and to me she said: 
'() friend, we trust that you esteem'd us not 
Too harsh to your companion yestermorn ; 
Unwillingly we spake.' 'No — not to her,' 
I answer'd, 'but to one of whom we spake 
Your Highness might have seem'd the thing 

you say.' 
'Again?' she cried, 'are you ambassadresses 
From him to me? we give you, being strange, 
A license; speak, and let the topic die.' 






I stammer'd that I knew him — could have 

wish'd— 
'Our king expects — was there no precontract ? 
There is no truer-hearted — ah, you seem 
All he prefigured, and he could not see 
The bird of passage flying south but long'd 
To follow. Surely, if your Highness keep 
Your purport, you will shock him even to 

death, 
Or baser courses, children of. despair.' 

'Poor boy,' she said, 'can he not read — no 

books ? 
Quoit, tennis, ball — no games? nor deals in 

that 
Which men delight in, martial exercise? 
To nurse a blind ideal like a girl ; 
Methinks he seems no better than a girl ; 
As girls were once, as we ourself have been. 
We had our dreams; perhaps he mixt with 

them. 
We touch on our dead self, nor shun to do it, 
Being other — since we learnt our meaning 

here, 



To lift the woman's fallen divinity 
Upon an even pedestal with man.' 

She paused, and added with a haughtier 
smile, 
'And as to precontracts, we move, my friend, 
At no man's beck, but know ourself and thee, 
O Vashti, noble A'ashti! Summon'd out 
She kept her state, and left the drunken king 
To brawl at Shushan underneath the palms.' 

'Alas, your Highness breathes full East,' 

I said, 
'On that which leans to you ! I know the 

Prince, 
I prize his truth. And then how vast a work 
To assail this gray preeminence of man ! 
You grant me license; might I use it? think; 
Ere half be done perchance your life may fail ; 
Then comes the feebler heiress of your plan, 
And takes and ruins all ; and thus your pains 
May only make that footprint upon sand 
Which old-recurring waves of prejudice 
Resmooth to nothing. Might I dread that 

you, 
With only Fame for spouse and your great 

deeds 
For issue, yet may live in vain, and miss 
Meanwhile what every woman counts her due, 
Love, children, happiness?' 

And she exclaim'd, 
'Peace, you young savage of the Northern 

wild ! 
What ! tho' your Prince's love were like a 

god's, 
Have we not made ourself the sacrifice? 
You are bold indeed; we are not talk'd to thus. 
Yet will we say for children, would they grew 
Like field-flowers everywhere ! we like them 

well : 
But children die ; and let me tell you, girl, 
Howe'er you babble, great deeds cannot die; 
They with the sun and moon renew their light 
For ever, blessing those that look on them. 



A MED LEY 



Children — that men may pluck them from our 

In arts. 

Kill vis with pity, break us with ourselves 
O — children — there is nothing upon earth 
More miserable than she thai bas a sun 
And sees him err. Nor would we work for 

fame : 
Tlio' she perhaps mighl nap the applause of 

( ii rat. 
Who learns the one l-or sro whence after- 

hands 
May move the world, tho' .sin: herself effect 
Hut little; wherefore up and act, nor shrink 
For fear our solid aim he dissipated 
}\y frail successors. Would, indeed, we had 

been, 
In lieu of many mortal flies, a race 
Of giants living each a thousand years, 
That we might see our own work out, and 

watch 
'I'Ik sandy footprint harden into stone.' 

I answer'd nothing, doubtful in myself 
If that strange poet-princess with her grand 
Imaginations might at all he won. 
And she broke out interpreting my thoughts: 

'No doubt we seem a kind of monster to 

you : 
We are used to that: for women, up 

till this 
Cramp'd under worse than South-sea-isle 

taboo, 
Dwarfs of the gynaeceum, fnil so far 
In high desire, they know not. cannot guess 
How much their welfare i- a passion to us. 
If we could give them surer, quicker proof — 
( ). if our i ml w ere less achiei able 
Hy slow approaches than by singli ad 
Of immolation, any phase of death. 
We were as prompt to spring against the 

pike -. 
Or down lh' fiery gulf as laik of it, 

'I'n compass our dear sisters' liberties.' 



She bow'd a- if to veil a noble tear; 
And up we came to where tin river sloped 
To plunge in cataract, shattering on black 

blocks 
A breadth of thunder. O'er it shook the 

woods, 
And danced the color, and. below, -tuck out 
The bones of some vast bulk that livid and 

roar'd 
Hi fori man was. She gazed awhile and -aid, 
"A- these rude hones to us, are we to her 
That will be.' -Dare we dream of that,' I 

ask'd, 
•Which wrought us, as the workman and his 

work. 
That practice betters?' "How,' she cried, 

'you love 
The metaphysics! read and earn our prize, 
A golden brooch. Beneath an emerald plane 
Sit- Diotima, teaching him that died 
Of hemlock- our device, wrought to the life — 
She rapt upon her subject, he on her; 
For there are school- for all." 'And yet.' 

I said. 
'Methinks I have not found among them all 
One anatomic.'' "Nay, we thought of that.' 
She answer'd, 'but it pleased us not; in truth 
We shudder but to dream our maids should 

ape 

Those monstrous males that carve the living 

hound, 
And cram him with the fragments of the 

ve. 
Or in the dark dissolving bun. an heart. 
And holy secrets of this microcosm, 
Dabbling a shameless hand with shameful 

jest, 
Encarnalize their spirit-. Yet we know 
Knowledge i- knowledge, and this matter 

hang.-. 
Howbeil ourself, foreseeing casualty, 

Nor willing men should come among us, 

learnt. 
For many weary moon- before we came, 



A*\ 



T 



THE PRINCESS 




Zttf* 




t«5S8i* ,v- 

J \ '■ 
i | 



iffl ' 
W § 



Tliis craft of healing. Were you sick, our- 

sclf 
Would tend upon vou. To your question now, 
Which touches on tin- workman and his work. 
Let there be light and there was light ; 't is SO, 
For was. and is, and will be, are but is, 
And all creation is one act at once, 
The birth of light ; but we that are not all, 
As parts, can see but parts, now this, now 

that, 
And live, perforce, from thought to thought, 

and make 
One act a phantom of succession. Thus 
Our weakness somehow shapes the shadow, 

Time; 
But in the shadow will we work, and mould 
The woman to the fuller day.' 

She spake 
With kindled eyes: we rode a league beyond, 
And, o'er a bridge of pinewood crossing, came 
On flowery levels underneath the crag, 
Full of all beauty. '0, how sweet,' I said, — 
For I was half-oblivious of my mask, — 
'To linger here with one that loved us !' 'Yea,' 
She answer'd, 'or with fair philosophies 
That lift the fancy ; for indeed these fields 
Are lovely, lovelier not the Elysian lawns. 
Where paced the demigods of old, and saw 




The soft white vapor streak the crowned 

towers 
Built to the Sun.' Then, turning to her maids, 
'Pitch our pavilion here upon the sward; 
Lay out the viands.' At the word, they raised 
A tent of satin, elaborately wrought 
With fair Comma's triumph; here she stood, 
Engirt with many a florid maiden-cheek, 
Tin woman - conqueror ; woman - conquer'd 

there 
The bearded Victor of ten-thousand hymns, 
And all the men mourn'd at his side. But we 
Set forth to climb ; then, climbing, Cyril kept 
With Psyche, with Melissa Florian, I 
With mine affianced. Many a little hand 
Glanced like a touch of sunshine on the rocks, 
Many a light foot shone like a jewel set 
In the dark crag. And then we turn'd, we 

wound 
About the cliffs, the copses, out and in, 
Hammering and clinking, chattering stony 

names 
Of shale and hornblende, rag and trap and 

tuff, 
Amygdaloid and trachyte, till the sun 
Grew broader toward his death and fell, and 

all 
The rosy heights came out above the lawns. 



r 

■ 

m I - , 



. 



_/ 







S O N G 



'I'ln splendor falls on castli walls 
A nd snow y summits old in Btorj ; 



The splendor falls on castle walls 
And snowy summits old in story ; 

The long light shakes across the lakes, 
And the wild cataract leaps in glory. 

Blow, hugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying. 

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, 
dying. 

O, hark, 0, hear! how thin and clear, 
And thinner, clearer, farther going! 

O, sweet and far from cliff" and scar 
The horns of Elfland faintly blowing! 

Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying, 

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, 
dying. 

O loye, they die in yon rich sky, 
The}' faint on hill or field or riyer ; 

Our echoes roll from soul to soul, 
And grow for eyer and for eyer. 

Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, 

And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, 
dying. 



PART FOUR 




PART FOUR 



•'I'iii'.ke sinks the nebulous star wc call the 

sun, 
If that hypothesis of theirs be sound,' 
Said Ida; 'let US down and rest;' and wc 
Down from the lean and wrinkled precipici s, 
By every coppice-feather' d chasm and cleft, 
Dropt thro' the ambrosial gloom to where below 
No bigger than a glowworm shone the tent 
Lamp-lit from the inner. Once sin lean'd on me, 
Descending: once or twice she lent her hand, 
And blissful palpitations in the blood 
Stirring a sudden transport rose and fell. 

But when we planted level feet, and dipt 
15. aeath tin Batin dome and enter'd in. 
There leaning deep in broider'd down we sank 
Our elbows; on a tripod in the midst 
A fragrant flame rose, and before us glow'd 
Fruit, blossom, viand, amber wine, and gold. 

Then she, 'Let some one sing to us: light- 
lier move 



The minutes fledged with music;" and a maid. 
Of those beside her, smote her harp and sang, 

'Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean 
Tears from the depth of some dii ine d< -pair 
lii-i in the heart, and gather to the eyes, 
In looking on the happy autumn-fields, 
And thinking of the days that are no more. 

'Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, 
That brings our friends up from the undi r 

world. 
Sad a- the last which reddens over one 
That sink- with all we love below tin \<rg, : 
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more. 

'Ah. sad and strange as in dark Milium] 
dawns 
The earliest pipe of half-awaken'd birds 
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes 
The casement slowly grows a glimmering 

square ; 
So sad. so strange, the days that are no more. 



THE PRINCESS 




'Dear as remember'd kisses after death, 
And sweel as those by hopeless fancy feign'd 
On lips thai are for others; deep as love, 
Deep as firs! love, and wild with all regret; 
O Death in Life, the days that are no more!' 

She ended with such passion that the tear 
She sang of shook and fell, an erring pearl 
Lost in her bosom; hut with some disdain 
Answer'd the Princess: 'If indeed there haunt 
About the moulder'd lodges of the past 
So sweet a voice and vague, fatal to men, 
Well needs it we should cram our ears with 

wool 
And so pace by. But thine are fancies hatch 'd. 
In silken-folded idleness ; nor is it 
AViser to weep a true occasion lost, 
But trim our sails, and let old bygones be, 
While down the streams that float us each 

and all 
To the issue, goes, like glittering bergs of 

ice, 
Throne after throne, and molten on the waste 
Becomes a cloud ; for all things serve their 

time 
Toward that great year of equal mights and 

rights. 
Nor would I fight with iron laws, in the end 
Found golden. Let the past be past, let be 
Their cancell'd Babels ; tho' the rough kex 

break 
The starr'd mosaic, and the beard-blown soafc 
Hang on the shaft, and the wild fig-tree split 
Their monstrous idols, care not while we hear 
A trumpet in the distance pealing news 
Of better, and Hope, a poising eagle, burns 
Above the unrisen morrow.' Then to me, 
'Know you no song of your own land,' she 

said, 
'Not such as moans about the retrospect, 
But deals with the other distance and 

the hues 
Of promise ; not a death's-head at 

the wine?' 



Then I remember'd one myself had made, 
What time I watch'd the swallow winging 

south 
From mine own land, part made long since, 

and part 
Now while I sang, and maiden-like as far 
As I could ape their treble did I sing. 

'O, Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying south. 
Fly to her, and fall upon her gilded eaves. 
And tell her, tell her, what I tell to thee. 

'(), tell her, Swallow, thou that knowest 
each, 
That bright and fierce and fickle is the 

South, 
And dark and true and tender is the North. 

'O Swallow, Swallow, if I could follow, and 
light 
Upon her lattice, I would pipe and trill, 
And cheep and twitter twenty million loves. 

'O, were I thou that she might take me in, 
And lay me on her bosom, and her heart 
Would rock the snowy cradle till I died! 

'Why lingereth she to clothe her heart with 
love, 
Delaying as the tender ash delays 
To clothe herself, when all the woods are 

green? 

'O, tell her, Swallow, that thy brood is 
flown ; 
Say to her, I do but wanton in the South, 
But in the North long since my nest is made. 

'0, tell her, brief is life but love is long, 
And brief the sun of summer in the North, 
And brief the moon of beauty in the South. 

'O Swallow, flying from the golden woods, 
Fly to her, and pipe and woo her, and make 

her mine, 
And tell her, tell her, that I follow thee.' 



A M ED LEY 



I ceased, and all the ladies, each at each, 
Like the Ithacensian suitors in old time, 
Stared with great eyes, and laugh'd with alien 

lips, 
And knew not what they meant; for still my 

voice 
Rang false. But smiling, 'Not for thee,' 

she said, 
'O Bulbul, any rose of Gulistan 
Shall hurst her veil: marsh-divers, rather, 

maid, 
Shall croak thee sister, or the meadow-crake 
Grate her harsh kindred in the grass— and 

tips 
A mere love-poem! O, for such, my friend. 
We hold them slight: they mind us of the 

time 
When we made bricks in Egypt. Knaves are 

men, 
That lute and flute fantastic tenderness, 
And dress the victim to the offering up, 
And paint the gates of Hell with Paradise, 
And play the slave to gain the tyranny. 
Poor soul! I had a maid of honor once: 
She wept her true eyes blind for such a one, 
A rogue of canzonets and serenades. 
I loved her. Peace he with her. She is dead. 
So they blaspheme the muse! But great is 

song 
Used to great ends; ourself have often tried 
Valkyrian hymns, or into rhythm have dash'd 
The passion of the prophetess; for song 
I-, duel" unto freedom, force and growth 
Of spirit, than to junketing and love. 
Love is it? Would this same mock-love, and 

this 
Mock-Hymen were laid up like winter hats, 
Till all men grew to rate us at our worth, 
Not vassals to he beat, nor pretty babes 

To lie dandled, no, hut living wills, and 

sphered 

Whole in ourselves and owed to none. 

Enough ! 
Hut now to leaven play with profit, you. 



Know you no song, the true growth of your 
soil. 

That gives the manners of your country- 
women '-' 

She spoke and turn'd her sumptuous head 

with eyes 
Of shining expectation fi\t on mine. 
Then while I dragg'd my brains for such a 

song. 
Cyril, with whom the bell-mouth'd glass had 

wrought, 
Or master'd by the sense of ^]>i>rt . began 
To troll a cart less, careless ta\ em-catch 
Of Moll and .Meg, and strange experiences 
Unmeet for ladies. Florian nodded at him, 
I frowning: Psyche flush'd and wann'd and 

shook : 
The lily-like Melissa dropp'd her brows. 
'Forbear,' the Princess cried: 'Forbear, sir,' I; 
And heated thro* and thro' with wrath and 

love, 
I smote him on the breast. He started up; 
There rose a shriek as of a city sack'd ; 
Melissa clamor'd, 'Flee the death;' "To 

horse !' 
Said Ida, "home! to horse!" and fled, as flies 
A troop of snowy doves athwarl tin dusk 
When some one batters at the dovecote doors, 
Disorderly the women. Alone I stood 
With Florian, cursing Cyril, vexi at heart 
In the pavilion. There like parting hopes 
I heard them passing from me: hoof by hoof, 
And every hoof a knell to my desin s, 
Clang'd on the bridge; and then another 

shriek, 
'The Head, the Head, the Frincess. (> the 

Head!' 
For blind with rage she miss'd the plank, and 

roll'd 
In the river. Out I sprang from glow to 

gloom : 
There whirl'd her white robe like a blossom'd 

branch 



V 




THE PRINCESS 






Rapt to the horrible fall. A glance I gave, 
No mure. lmt woman-vested as I was 
Plunsred, and the flood drew; yet I causthl 
t 11 her; then 

** Oaring one arm. and bearing m my left 
The weight of all the hopes of half the 

world, 
Strove to buffet to land in vain. A tree 
Was half-disrooted from his place and 

stoop'd 
To drench his dark locks in the gurgling 

wave 
Mid-channel. Right on this we drove and 

caugl I . 
And grasping down the boughs I gain'd the 

shore. 




N 



There stood her maidens glimmeringly 
group'd 

In tlu' hollow hank. One reaching forward 

drew 
M\ burthen from mine arms: they cried. "She 

lives.' 
They bore her hack into the tent: but I. 
So much a kind oi' shame within me wrought. 
Not vet endured to meet her opening eves. 
Nor found my friends; hut push'd alone on 

foot — 
For since her horse was lost I left her mine 1 — 
Across the woods, and less from Indian craft 
Than beelike instinct hiveward, found at 

length 
The garden portals. Two great statues. Art 
And Science. Caryatids, lifted up 
A weight of emblem, and betwixt were valves 
Of open-work in which the hunter rued 
His rash intrusion, manlike, hut his brows 
Had sprouted, and the branches thereupon 
Spread out at top. ami grimly spiked the 

gates. 



And. tost on thoughts that changed from 

line to hue. 
Now poring on the glowworm, now the .-tar. 
1 paced the terrace, till the Hear had uluel'd 
Thro" a great arc his seven slow -nib. 

A step 
Of lightest echo, then a loftier form 
Thau female, moving thro' the uncertain 

gloom, 
Disturbed me with the doubt 'if this were she,' 
Hut it was Florian. "Hist. O. hist!' he said, 
'They seek us; out so late is out of rules. 
Moreover, "Seize tie strangers" is the cry. 
How came you lure:* I told him. 'I.* said he, 
"I.a-t of tin train, a moral leper, I, 
To whom none spake, half-sick at heart, re- 

turn'd. 
Arriving all confused among the rest 
With hooded brows 1 crept into the hall. 
And. couch'd behind a Judith, underneath 
The head o\' Ilolofonu- peep'd and saw. 
Girl after girl was call'd to trial: each 
Disclaim'd all knowledge of us: last of all, 
Melissa : trust me. sir. I pitied her. 
She. question'd if she knew u.s men. at first 
Was silent: closer prest, denied it not. 
And then, demanded if her mother knew. 
Or Psyche, -he affirm'd not. or denied: 
From whence the Royal mind, familiar with 

her. 
Easily gather'd either guilt. She sent 
For Psyche, hut she was not there: she call'd 
lor Psyche's child to cast it from the doors; 
She sent for Blanche to accuse her face to 

face : 
And I slipt out. But whither will you now? 
And where are Psyche. Cyril? both are Med: 
What, if together? that were not so well. 
Would rather we had never come! I dread 
His wildncss, and the chance- of the dark.' 



A little space w a- left between the horns. 
Thro' which I clamber'd o'er at top with pain. 
Dropt on the sward, and up the linden walks. 



'And vat." I said, 'you wrong him more 
than I 
That struck him; this i- proper to the clown, 



A MEDLEY 



Tho' smock'd, or furr'd and purpled, still 

the down, 
To harm the thing that trusts him, and to 

shame 
That which he says he loves. For Cyril, 

]i<>» e'er 
lie deal in frolic, as to-night — the song- 
Might have been worse and sinn'd in grosser 

lips 
Beyond all pardon — as it is. I hold 
These flashes on the surface are not he. 
He has a solid base of temperament : 
Hut a.s the water-lily starts and slides 
Upon the level in little puffs of wind, 
Tim' anehor'd to the bottom, such is he.' 

Scarce had I ceased when from a tamarisk 

near 

Two Proctors leapt upon us, crying, "Name--!' 
He, standing still, was clutch'd; but I began 
To thrid the musky-circled mazes, wind 
And double in and out the boles, and race 
By all the fountains. Fleet I was of foot; 

Hi fore me shower'd the rose in (lakes; behind 
I heard the puff'd pursuer; at mine ear 
Hubliled the nightingale and heeded not, 
And secret laughter tickled all my soul. 
At last I hook'd my ankle in a vine 
That claspt the feet of a Mnemosyne, 
And falling on my face was caught and 
know n. 

They haled us to the Princess where she 

sat 
High in the hall: above her droop'd a lamp, 

And made the single jewel on her brow 

Burn like the mystic fire on a mast-head, 
Prophel of storm; a handmaid on each side 
Bow'd toward her, combing out her long black 

haii- 
Damp from the river: and close behind her 

stood 
Fight daughters of the plough, stronger than 

men. 



Hugi women blowzed with health, and wind, 

and rain. 
And labor. Each was like a Druid reek: 
Or like a spire of land that stands apart 
Chft from the main, and wail*d about with 

nu W s. 

Then, as wc came, the crowd dividing clove 
An advent to the throne; and therebeside, 

Half-naked as if caught at ono from b.d 
And tumbled on the purple fcotcloth, lav 
Tin lily-shining child: and on the left, 
Bow'd on her palms and folded up from 

w rong, 
Her round white shoulder shaken with her 

sobs. 

Milissa knelt: but Lady Blanche ereel 
Slum! up and spake, an affluent orator: 

*It was not thus, () Princess, in old days; 
You prized my counsel, lived upon my lips. 
I led you Hun to all I he Castalies ; 
I fed you with the milk of \<r\ Muse; 

I loved you like this kneclcr. and you me 
Your second mother, those win gracious 

times. 
Then came your new friend: you began to 

change — 
I saw it and grieved- to slacken and to cool; 
Till taken with her seeming openness 
You turn'd your warmer currents all 

to her. 

To me you froze; this was my meed for all. 
Yet I bore up in part from ancient love, 
And partly that I hoped to win you back, 
And partly conscious of ovj own deserts, 
And partly that you were my civil head, 
And chiefly you wire born for something 

great, 
In which I might your fellow-worker be, 

When time should serve; and thus a noble 

si'ln nir 

Grew up from seed we two long sine- had 
sou n : 




1 . 



' 



I 



THE PRINCESS 







■ - "J 



■ 




' 



In us true growth, in her a Jonah's gourd, 
I'}) in one night and due to sudden sun. 
We took tlii> palace; but even from the first 
You stood iii your own light and darken'd 

mine. 
What student came but that you planed lier 

path 
To Lady Psyche, younger, not so wise, 
A foreigner, and I your countrywoman, 
I your old friend and tried, she new in all? 
But still her lists were swell'd and mine wire 

lean : 
Yet I bore up in hope slie would be known. 
Then came these wolves: they knew her; they 

endured, 
Long-closeted with her tbc yestermorn, 
To tell her what they were, and she to hear. 
And me none told. Not less to an eye like 

mine, 
A Iidless watcher of the public weal. 
Last night, their ma.sk was patent, and my 

foot 
Was to you. But I thought again ; I fear'd 
To meet a cold ''We thank you, we shall hear 

of it 
From Lady Psyche:" you had gone to her, 
She told, perforce, and winning easy grace. 
No doubt, for slight delay, remain'd among us 
In our young nursery still unknown, the stem 
Less grain than touchwood, while my honest 

heat 
Were all miscounted as malignant haste 
To push my rival out of place and power. 
But public use required she should be known; 
And since my oath was ta'en for public use, 
I broke the letter of it to keep the sense. 
I spoke not then at first, but watch'd them 

well. 
Saw that they kept apart, no mischief done; 
And yet this day — tho' you should hate me 

for it— 
I came to tell you ; found that you had gone. 
Ridden to the hills, she likewise. Xow, I 

thought. 



That surely she will speak; if not, then I. 
Did she? These monsters blazon'd what they 

were, 
According to the coarseness of their kind. 
For thus I hear: and known at last — my 

work — 
And full of cowardice and guilty shame — 
I grant in her some sense of shame — she flies; 
And I remain on whom to wreak your rage, 
I. that have lent my life to build up yours, 
I, that have wasted here health, wealth, and 

time, 
And talent. I — you know it — I will not boast : 
Dismiss me, and I prophesy your plan. 
Divorced from my experience, will be chaff 
For every gust of chance, and nun will say 
We did not know the real light, but 

chased 
The wisp that flickers where no foot can 

tread.' 

She ceased; the Princess answer'd coldlv, 
'Good : 
Your oath is broken ; we dismiss you, go. 
For this lost lamb' — she pointed to the child — 
'Our mind i.s changed : we take it to ourself.' 

Thereat the lady stretch'd a vulture throat, 
And shot from crooked lips a haggard smile. 
'Tlie plan was mine. I built the nest,' she 

said, 
'To hatch the cuckoo. Rise !' and stoop'd to 

updrag 
Melissa. She, half on her mother propt, 
Half-drooping from her, turn'd her face, and 

cast 
A liquid look on Ida, full of prayer, 
Which melted Florian's fancy as she hung. 
A Xiobean daughter, one arm out, 
Appealing to the bolts of heaven : and while 
We gazed upon her came a little stir 
About the doors, and on a .sudden rush'd 
Among us, out of breath, as one pursued, 
A woman-post in flying raiment. Fear 



A ME D LEY 



Stared in her eyes, and chalk'd her face, and 

wing'd 
Her transit to the throne, whereby she fell 
Delivering seal'd dispatches which the Head 
Took half-amazed, and in her lion's mood 
Tore open, silent we with blind surmise 
Regarding, while she read, till over brow 
And cheek and bosom brake the wrathful 

bloom 
As of some fire against a stormy cloud. 
When the wild peasant rights himself, the rick 
Flames, and Ins anger reddens in the heavens; 
For anger most it seem'd, while now her 

breast, 
Beaten with some great passion at her heart, 
Palpitated, her hand shook, and we heard 
In the dead hush the papers that she held 
Rustle. At once the lost lamb at her feel 
Sent out a hitter bleating for its dam. 
The plaintive cry jarr'd on her ire; she 

crush'd 
The scrolls together, made a sudden turn 
As if to speak, hut, utterance failing her. 
She whirl'd them on to me, as who should say 
'Read,' and I read -two letters — one her 

sire's : 

'Fair daughter, when we sent the Prince 
your way 
We knew not your ungracious laws, which 
learnt, 

We, conscious of what temper you are built, 
Came all in haste to hinder wrong, but fell 
Into his father's hand, who has this night, 
You lying close upon his territory. 
Slipt round and in the dark invested you, 
And lure he keeps me hostage for his son.' 
The second was my father's running thus: 
'You have our son ; touch not a hair of his 

head : 
Render him up unscathed; give him your 

hand ; 
Cleave to your contract — tho' indeed we hear 
You hold the woman is the belter man: 



A rampant heresy, such as if it spread 
Would make all women kick against their 

lords 
Thro' all the world, and which might well 

di serve 
That we tliis- night should pluck your palace 

(low n : 
And we will do it, unless you send US back 
Our son, on the instant, whole.' 

So far 1 read ; 
And then stood up and spoke impetuously : 

'O, not to pry and peer on ycur reservi . 
But led by golden wishes, and a hope 

The child of regal compact, did I break 
Your precinct ; not a scorner of youi sex 
But venerator, zealous it should be 
All that it might be. Hear me, for I bear, 
Tho' man, yet human, whatsoe'er your 

wrongs, 
From the flaxen curl to the gray lock a life 
Less mini than yours. My nurse would tell 

mi of you : 
I babbled for you. as babies for the moon. 
Vague brightness; when a boy, you Btoop'd 

to me 
From all high places, lived in all fair lights. 
Came in long breezes rapt from inmost south 
And blown to inmost north; at e\e and dawn 
With Ida, Ida, Ida. rang the woods; 
The leader wild-swan in among the stars 
Would clang it, and lapt in wreaths of glow- 
worm light 
The mellow breaker murmur'd Ida. Now. 
Because I would have reaeh'd you, hail you 

been 
Sphered up with Cassiopeia, or the enthroned 
Persephone in Hades, now at length, 
Those winters of abeyance all worn out, 
A man I canu to see you: but, indeed, 
Not in this frequence can I lend full tongue, 
() noble Ida. to those thoughts that wait 
On you, their O ntre. Ll I me say hut this. 
That many a famous man and woman, town 




THE PRINCESS 








And Iandskip, have I heard of s after seen 
The dwarfs of presage; tho' when known, 

there gri n 
Another kind of beauty in detail 
Made them worth knowing ; but in you I found 
M\ boyish dream involved and dazzled down 
And master'd, while that after-beauty makes 
Such head from ad to act, from hour to hour. 
'Within me, that except you slay me here, 
According to your bitter statute book, 
I cannot ceasi to follow you, as they saj 
Tho seal docs music; who desire you more 
Than growing boys their manhood; dying 

lips, 
With many thousand matters left to <lo. 
The breath of life; (), more than poor men 

wealth, 
Than sick nun health — yours, yours, not. 

mine- hut halt' 
Without you; with you. whole; and of those 

hah es 
You worthiest ; and howe'er you block and bar 
Your heart with system out from mine. I hold- 
That it becomes no man to nurse de-pair, 
Hut in the teeth of clench'd antagonisms 
To follow up the worthiest till lie die. 
Yc t that I came not all unauthorized 
Behold your father's letter.' 

On one knee 
Kneeling, I gave it. which she caught, and 

dash'd 
Unopen'd at her feet- A tide of fierce 
Invective seem'd to wait behind her lips. 
As waits a river level with the dam 
Ready to hurst and flood the world with foam; 
And so -he would have spoken, hut there rose 
A huhhuh in the court of half the maids 
Gathered together; from the illumined hall 
Long lanes o\' splendor slanted o'er a press 
Of snow v shoulders, thick as herded ewes, 
And rainbow robes, and gems and oemlike 

eyes. 
And gold and golden heads. They to and 

fro 



Fluctuated, as flowers in storm, some red. some 

pale. 

All open-mouth'd, all gazing to the light. 
Some crying there was an army in the land, 
And some that men were in the very walls, 
And some thc\ cared not: till a clamor grew 
As of a new-world Babel, woman-built, 
And worse-confounded. High above them 

stood 

'I'ln placid marble Muses, looking peace. 

Not pi ace she look'd. the Head; hut ris- 
ing up 
Robed in the long night of her deep hair, so 
To the open window moved, remaining there 
Fixt like a beacon-tower above the waves 
Of tempest, when the crimson rolling eye 
Glares ruin, and the wild birds on the light 
Dash themselves dead. She stretch'd her arms 

and call'd 
Aero— the tumult, and the tumult fell. 

"What fear ye, brawlers? am not I your 
Head? 

On me. inc. me. the storm first breaks; / dare 
All these male thunderbolts; what is it ye fear? 
Peace! then are those to avenge us am' they 

come : 
If net, myself were like enough. O girls. 
To unfurl the maiden banner of our rights, 
And clad in iron hurst the ranks of war. 
Or. falling, protomartyr of our cause, 
Die; yet I blame you not so much tor fear; 
Six thousand years of fear have madi you 

that 
From which I would redeem you. But for 

those 
That stir this hubbub — you and you — I know 
Your faces there in the crowd — to-morrow 

morn 
We hold a great convention: then shall they 
That love their voices more than duty, learn 
With whom they deal, dismiss'd in shame to 

live 



A M E D LEY 



No wiser than their mothers, household stuff, 
Live chattels, mincers of each other's fame, 
Full of weak poison, turnspits for the clown, 
The drunkard's football, laughing stocks of 

Time, 
Whose brains arc in their hands and in their 

In els, 
Hut tit to flaunt, to dress, to dance, In thrum, 
To tramp, to scream, to burnish, and to scour, 
For ever slaves al home and fools abroad.' 

She. ending, waved her hands; thereal the 
crowd 
Muttering, dissolved; then with a smile, thai 

ik'd 
A stroki of <rui I sunshine on the cliff, 
When all the glens are drown'd in azure gloom 
Of thunder-shower, she floated to us and said: 

"You have dour well and like a gentleman, 
And like a princi ; you have our thanks for 

all. 
And you look will too in your woman's dress. 
Well have you done and like a gentleman. 
You saved our lifi ; we owe you bitter thanks. 
Better have died and spill our bones in the 

flood- 
Then men had said— but now — what hinders 

me 
To take such bloody vengeance on you 

both?— 
Yrt since our father- wasps in our good hive, 
You would I i quenchers of the light to be, 
Barbarians, grosser than your native bears — 
t ). would I had his sceptre for one hour! 
You that have dared to hrcak our hound, and 

gull'd 

Our servants, wrong'd and lied and thwarted 

us — 
I wed with thee! / hound by precontract 
Your bride, your bondslave! not tho' all the 

gold 

That veins tin- world wire paek'd to make 
your crown. 



And every spoken tongue should lord you. 

Sir. 

Your falsi h I and yourseif are hateful to us ; 

I trample on your offers and Oli you. 
Begom : we will nol look uuon you more. 
Hi re, push them out at gates.' 

In w iat h she spake. 
Then those eighl mighty daughters of the 

plough 
Heni their broad faces toward us and ad- 

dress'd 
Their motion. Twice I sought to plead my 

cause. 
Hut on my shoulder hung their heavy hands, 
The weigh! of destinj ; so from her face 
They push'd us, down the steps, and thro' 

the court. 
And with grim laughter thrust us out at 

gates. 

We cross'd the street and gain'd a petty 
mound 
Beyond it. whence we saw the lights and heard 

The voices murmuring. While I listen'd, 

came 
On a sudden the weird seizure and the doubt. 
I seem'd to move among a world of ghosts; 
The Princess with her monstrous woman- 
guard, 
The jist and earnest working side by side. 
The cataract and the tumuli and the kings 
Were shadows; and the long fantastic night 
With all its doings had and had not been, 
And all things were and were nol. 

This went by 
As strangely as it came, and on my spirits 

Settled a gentle cloud of melancholy — 
Not long; I shook it off: for spite of doubts 
And sudden ghostly shadow inos I was one 
To whom the touch of all mischance hut 

came 
As nijrlit to him that sitting on a hill 
Sees the midsummer, midnight, Norway sun 
Set into sunrise: then we moved away. 






r.'stV 



I N T E RLU D E. 

Thy voice is heard thro' rolling drums 
Thai beal to battle h here he stands ; 
Thy face across his fancy comes, 

And gn is I In h.ii 1 1, tn his hands. 
A moment, while the trumpets Mow, 

I Ic sees liis In- I aboul I li v kin i : 

The next, like fire he m< el s the foe, 

And si rikes him di ad for thine and 1 1 ee. 

So Lilia sang. We though! her half possessed, 
She struck such warbling fury thro' the words; 
And. after, feigning pique at uliat she call'd 
The raillery, or grotesque, or false sublime 
Like one thai wishes at a dance to change 
The music clapl her hands and cried for war, 
Or some grand fighl to kill and make an end. 
And he that next inherited the tale, 
Half turning to the broken statue, said, 
'Sir lialph lias got your colors; if I prove 

Your knight, and fighl your battle, whal for me?' 
It chanced, her empty glove upon the tomb 

I.a\ by her like a model of her band. 
Silc took it and she riling it. 'Fight,' she said. 
'And make us all we would be, greal and good.' 
He knightlike in bis cap instead of casque. 
A cap of Tyrol borrow'd from the hall, 
Arranged the favor, and assumed the Prince. 



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PART FIVE 





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PART FIVE 



Now, scarce three paces measured from the 

mound, 
We stumbled on a stationary voice, 
And "Stand, who goes?' 'Two from the pal- 
ace,' I. 
'The second two; they wait.' he said, "pass on: 
His Highness wakes;' and one that clash'd 

in arms, 
By glimmering lams and walls of canvas led 
Threading the soldi, r city, till we heard 
Tin drowsj folds of our greal ensign shake 
From blazon'd lions o'er the imperial ten! 
Whispers of war. 

Entering, t he sudden lighi 
Dazed me half-blind. I stood and seem'd to 

hear, 
As in a poplar grove when a lighl wind wakes 
A lisping of the innumerous leaf and diis. 
Each hissing in his neighbor's car: and then 
A strangled titter, out of which then brake 



On all sides, clamoring etiquette to death, 

Unmeasured mirth: while now the tun old 
kit. os 

Began to wag their baldness up ami down. 

The fresh young captains flash'd their glit- 
tering teeth. 

The huge bush-bearded barons heaved and 
blew, 

And slain with laughter roli'd the gilded 
squire. 

At length my sire, his rough cheelt wet with 
tears, 
Panted from weary sides, 'King, you arc free! 

We did hut keep you -ui< Iv for our son, 
If this he he.- or a draggled mawkin, thou, 
That te;uK her bristled grunters in the 

sludgi ;' 
I'm I was drench'd with ooz . and torn with 

briers, 



THE PRINCESS 















> 



$* 



.More crumpled than a poppy from the sheath, 
And all one raj;-, disprinced from head to heel. 
Then some one senl beneath his vaulted palm 
A whisper'd jest to some one near him, "Look, 
He has been among his shadows.' "Satan taki 
TIk oid women and their shadows I* — thus the 

king 
Roar'd — "make yourself a man to fight with 

men. 
Go : Cyril told us all." 

As boys that slink 
From ferule and the trespass-chiding eye, 
Away we stole, and transient in a trice 
From what was left of faded woman-slough 
'I'o sheathing splendors and the golden scale 
Of harness, issued in the sun, that now 
Leapt from the dewy shoulders of the earth, 
And hit the Northern hills. Here Cyril met us, 
A little shy at first, but by and by 
We twain, with mutual pardon ask'd and 

given 
For stroke and song, rcsolder'd peace, whereon 
Follow'd his tale. Amazed he fled away 
Thro' the dark land, and later in the night 
Had come on Psyche weeping: 'then we fell 
Into your father's hand, and there she lies, 
But will not speak nor stir.' 

He show'd a tent 
A stone-shot off; we enter'd in, and there 
Among piled arms and rough accoutrements, 
Pitiful sight, wrapp'd in a .soldier's cloak, 
Like some sweet sculpture draped from head 

to foot, 
And push'd by rude hands from its pedestal, 
All her fair length upon the ground she lay; 
And at her head a follower of the camp, 
A charr'd and wrinkled piece of womanhood, 
Sat watching like a watcher by the dead. 

Then Florian knelt, and 'Come,' lie whis- 
tler" d to her, 

'Lift up your head, sweet sister ; lie not thus. 

What have you done but right ? you could not 
slay 



Me, nor your prince: look up, be comforted. 
Sunt is it to have done the thing one ought, 
When fallen in darker ways.' And likewise I: 
"He comforted; have I not lost her too. 
In whose leas! act abides the nameless charm 
That none has else for me?' She heard, she 

moved, 
She moan'd, a folded voice: and up she sat. 
And raised the cloak from hrows as pale 

and smooth 
As those that mourn half-shrouded oxer death 
In deathless marble. 'Her,' she said, 'my 

friend — 
Parted from her — betray'd her cause and 

mine — 
Where .shall I breathe? why kept ye not your 

faith? 
() base and had! what comfort? none for me!' 
To whom remorseful Cyril, 'Vet I pray 
Take comfort; live, dear lady, for your 

child!' 
At which she lifted up her voice and cried: 

'Ah me, my babe, my blossom, ah, my child, 
My one sweet child, whom I shall see no more! 
For now will cruel Ida keep her back ; 
And either she will die from want of care, 
Or sicken with ill-usage, when they say 
The child is hers — for every little fault. 
The child is hers; and they will heat my girl 
Remembering her mother — O my flower ! 
Or they will take her, they will make her hard, 
And she will pass me by in after-life 
With .some cold reverence worse than were 

she dead. 
Ill mother that I was to leave her there, 
To lag behind, scared by the cry they made, 
Tlie horror of the shame among them all. 
But I will go and sit beside the doors, 
And make a wild petition night and day, 
Until they hate to hear me like a wind 
Wailing for ever, till they open to me, 
And lay my little blossom at my feet. 
My babe, my sweet Aglai'a, my one child: 



A M E D LEY 



And I will hike her up and go my way, 
And satisfy my soul with kissing her. 
Ali! what might that m.'in not deserve of me 
Who gave me back my child?' 'He com- 
fort id." 
Said (Aril, 'you shall have it :' hut again 
She veil'd her brows, and prone she sank, 

and mi. 
Like tender things that being caught feign 

death, 
Spoke nut, nor stirr'd. 

By this a murmur ran 
Thro" all the camp, and inward rand the 

scouts 
With rumor of Prince Arac hard at hand. 
We left her by the woman, and without 
Found the gray kings at parle; and 'Look 

vmi.' cried 
My father, 'that our compact he fulfill'd. 
You have spoilt this child: she laughs at 

vnu and man : 
She wrongs herself, her sex, and me, and 

him. 
Rut red-faced war has rods of steel and fire; 
She yields, or war.' 

Then (Jama turu'd to me: 
'We fear, indeed, you spent a stormy time 
With our strange girl; and vet they say that 

still 

You love her. Give us, then, your mind at 

large : 
How say you, war or not?' 

'Not war, if possibli . 
() king, 9 T said, "lest from the abuse of war, 
The desecrated shrine, the trampled year, 
The smouldering homestead, and the housi 

hold flower 
Torn from the lintel — all the common 

wrong — 
A smoke go up thro' which I loom to her 
Three limes a monster. Now she lightens 

scorn 
At him that mars her plan, hut then would 

hate — 



Ai.d every voice she talk'd with ratify if. 
And everj face she look'd on justify it — 
The general foe. -More solubli is this knot 
R\ gentleness than war. I want her love. 
What were I nigher this altho' we dash'd 
Your cities into s!. ;i nls with catapults? — 
She would mil love or brought her chain'd, 

a s'.'Lle. 

The lifting of whose eyelash is my lord? 

Not ever would sin lovi . hut brooding turn 
Tin book ot scorn, till all my flitting chance 
Were caught within the record of her wrongs 
And crush'd to death: and rather, Sire, than 

this 

I would Ihi old god of war himself w< re dead, 
Forgotten, rusting on his iron hills, 
Hot t inn' on some w ild shore with ribs of wreck, 
Or like an old world mammoth bulk'd in ice, 
Not to he molten out.' 

And roughly spake 
My father: 'Tut, you know them not, the 

oirls. 
Boy, when I hear you prate I almost think 
That idiot legend credible. Look you, sir! 
Man is the hunter: woman is his game. 

The sleek and shining creatures of the chase. 
We hunt them for the beauty of their skins; 
Thev love Us for it, and we ride them down. 
Wheedling and siding with them! Out! for 

shame ! 
Hoy. there's no rose that's half so dear to them 
As he that does the thing they dare not do. 

Breathing and sounding beauteous battle, 
comes 

With the air of the trumpet round him, and 

leaps in 
Among I he women, snares them by the score 
Flattcr'd and fbistcr'd, wins, tho' dash'd with 

death 
He reddens what he kisses. Thus 1 won 
Your mother, a good mother, a good wife. 
Worth winning; but this firebrand — gentle- 
ness 

To such as her! if Cyril .spake her true, 




I vy ' 



THE PRINCESS 




To catch ;i dragon in a cherry net, 
To t r^fi a tigress h ith a gossamer, 
Were » isdom to it.' 

'Yea, but, Sire,' I crii d, 
'Wild natures need wise curbs. The soldier? 

No! 
Whal dares not Ida do thai she should prize 
The soldier? I beheld her, when she rose 
The yesternight, and storming in extremes 
Stood for her cause, and Sung defiance down 
Gagelike to man. and had not shunn'd the 

death, 
No, not the soldier's; yel I hold her, king, 
True woman: but von clash them all in one, 
Thai have as many differences as we. 
The violet varies from the Lily as far 
As oak from elm. One loves the soldier, one 
The silken priest of peace, one this. one that. 
And some unworthily; their sinless faith, 
A maiden moon that sparkles on a sty, 
Glorifying clown and satyr; whence the) 

Heed 

More breadth of culture. Is not Ida right.' 

They worth it? truer to the law within? 

Severer in the logic of a life? 

Twice as magnetic to sweet influences 

Of earth and heaven: and she of whom you 

speak, 
My mother, looks as whole as some serene 
Creation minted in the golden moods 
Of sovereign artists; not a thought, a touch, 
But pure as lines of green that streak the 

white 
Of the first snowdrop's inner leaves; I say. 
Not like the piebald miscellany, man. 
Bursts of great heart and slips in sensual 

mire, 
But whole and one; and take them all-in-all, 
Were we ourselves hut half as good, as kind. 
As truthful, much that Ida claims as right 
Had ne'er been mooted, hut as frankly theirs 
A- dues of Nature. To our point; not war. 
Lest I lose all.' 

'Nay, nay, you spake hut sense, 



Said (lama. "We remember love ourself 
In our sweet youth; we did not rate him then 
This red hot iron to he .shaped with blows. 
You talk almost like Ida; she can talk: 
And there is something in it as you say : 
But you talk kindlier; w e esteem you for it. — 
He seems a gracious and a gallant Prince, 
I would he had our daughter. For the rest, 
Our own detention, why. the causes weigh'd, 
Fatherly fears — you used us courteously — 
We would do much to gratify your Prince — 
We pardon it : and for your ingress here 
Upon the skirt and fringe of our fair laud. 
You did hut come as goblins in the night. 
Nor in the furrow broke the ploughman's 

head, 
Nor burnt the grange, nor buss'd the iiulk- 

ing-maid, 
Nor robb'd the farmer of his howl of cream. 
But let your Prince — our royal word upon it, 
He comes hack safe — ride with us to our lines. 
And speak with Arae. Arac'.s word is thrice 
As ours with Ida: something may he done — 
I know not what — and ours shall see us 

friends. 
You, likewise, our late guest.s, if so you will, 
Follow us. Who knows? we four may build 

some plan 
Foursquare to opposition.' 

Here he reach'd 
White hands of farewell to my sire, who 

grow I'd 
An answer which, half-muffled in his heard. 
Let so much out that gave us leave to go. 

Then rode we with the old king across the 

law ns 
Beneath huge trees, a thousand rings of 

Spring- 
In every hole, a song on every spray 
Of birds that piped their Valentines, and woke 
Desire in me to infuse my tale of love 
In the old king's ears, who promised help, 

and oo/ed 



A M ED LBV 



All o'er with honey'd answer as we rode; 
And blossom-fragranl slip! the heavy dews 

Gather" d by nioht and peace, with each light 

air 
On our mail'd heads. Hut othi r thoughts than 

peace 
Burnt in us, when we saw th< embattled 

squan-, 
Ami squadrons of the Prince, trampling the 

flowers 
With clamor : for among them rose a cry 
As it' to greet the king; they made a halt; 
The horses yell'd; they clash'd their arm-: 

the drum 
Heat; merrily-blowing shrill'd the martial 

fife ; 
And in the blast and bray <it' the long horn 
And serpent-throated bugle, undulated 
The banner. Anon to meet us lightly pranced 
Three captains out : nor ever had I seen 
Such thews of nun. The midmo-t and the 

highest 
Wa- Arac: all about his motion clung 
The shadow of his sister, as the beam 
Of the East, that play'd upon them, made 

them glance 
Like those three stars of the airy Giant's 

zone, 
That glitter burnish'd by the frosty dark; 
And as the fiery Siriiis alters hue. 
And bicker- into red and emerald, shone 
Their morions, wash'd with morning, as they 

came. 

And I that prated peace, when first I heard 

War-music, felt the blind wild-beast of force, 

Whose home is in the sinews of a man. 

Stir in me as to strike. Then took the king 

Hi.- three broad -on-: with now a wandering 

hand 
And now a poind d finger, told them all. 
A common light of -miles at our disguise 
Broke frcm their hp.s. and. ere the windy 

jest 



Had labor'd down within his ample lungs, 
The genial giant, Arac, roll'd him 

Thrice in the -addle, then burst out in word-: 

'Our land invaded, '-death! and he hi' 
Your captive, yet my father wills not war! 
And. 'sdeath! myself, what care I. war or no? 
Hut tin n tills ([Ui -I inn of your troth remain- ; 
And there's a downright honest meaning in 

her. 
She flies too high, she this too high! and yet 

ask'd but -pace and fair-play for her 

scheme : 
She prest and prest i' on me— I myself, 
What know I of these things? but. life and 

soul ! 

I thought her half-right talking of her 
wrongs : 

I say she tlie- too high, 'sdeach! what of that? 

I take her for the flower of u ankind. 

And so I often told her, right or wrong; 
And, Prince, she can lie sweet to those she 

love-. 

And. right or wrong, I care not : this i- all, 
I stand upon her side; -In made me swear it — 



'Sdeatl 



il with solemn lite- b\ candle 



light— 
Swear by Saint something — I forget her 

Name — 
Her that talk'd down the fifty wisest men: 
She wa- a princess too: ami so I -wore. 
Come, tin- i- all: she will not; waive your 

claim. 
If not. the foughten field, what else, at once 
Decides it. "-death! against my father's will.' 

I lagg'd in answer, loth to render up 
My precontract, .and loth by brainless war 
To cleave the rift of different deeper yet; 
Till one of those two brother-, half aside 
And fingering at the hair about hi- lip. 
To prick us on to combat, 'Like to like! 
Tin woman'- garment hid the woman'- heart.' 
A taunt that eleiieh'd hi- purpose like a blow ! 



>>'• 







THE PRINCESS 




\ For fiery-short was Cyril's counter-scoff, 

Anil sharp I answered, touch'd upon the point 

■ j£\ Where idle boys are cowards to their shame, 
'Decide it here; why not: we are three to 
three.' 

Then spake the third: 'But three to three? 
no more? 
No more, and in our noble sister's cause? 
More, more, for honor! everj captain waits 
Hungry for honor, angry tor hi- king. 
More, more, some fifty on a side, that each 
May breathe himself, and quick ! by overthrow 
Of these or those, the question settled die.' 

'Yea,' answer'd I, 'for this wild wreath of 

air. 
This flake of rainbow flying on the highest 
Foam of men's deeds — this honor, if ye will. 
It needs must lie for honor if at all; 
Since, what decision? if we fail we fail, 
And if we win we fail : she would not keep 
Her compact.' ' 'Sdeath! but we will send to 

her.' 
Said Arac, 'worthy reasons why she should 
Bide by this issue; let our missive thro', 
And you shall have her answer by the word.' 

'Boys!' shriek'd the old king, but vainlier 

than a hen 
To her false daughters in the pool; for none 
Regarded ; neither seem'd there more to say. 
Back rode we to my father's camp, and 

found 
He thrice had sent a herald to the gates, 
To learn if Ida yet would cede our claim, 
Or by denial flush her babbling wells 
With lur own people's life; three times he 

went. 
The first, he blew and blew, but none appear'd : 
He batter'd at the doors, none came: the next, 
An awful voice within had warn'd him thence; 
The third, and those eight daughters of the 

plough 



Came -.allying thro' the gates, ; nd caught his 

hair, 
And so belabor' d him on rib and cheek 
They made him wild. Not less one glance he 

caught 
Thro' open doors of Ida station'd there 
Unshaken, clinging to her purpose, firm 
Tho' compass'd by two armies and the noise 
Of arms; and standing like a stately pine 
Set In a cataract on an island-crae, 
When storm is on the heights, and right and 

left 

Suck'd from the dark heart of the long hills 
roll 

The torrents, dash'd to the vale: and yet her 

will 
Bred will in me to overcome it or fall. 

But when I told the king that I was pledged 
To fight in tourney for my br'de, he clash'd 
His iron palms together with a cry ; 
Himself would tilt it out among the lads; 
But overborne by all hi- bearded lords 
With reasons drawn from age and state, per- 
force 
He yielded, wroth and red, with fierce demur; 
And many a bold 1 night started up in heat, 
And sware to combat for my claim till death. 

All on this side the palace ran the field 
Flat to the garden-wall : and likewise here, 
Above the garden's glowing blossom-belts, 
A column'd entry shone and marble stairs. 
And great bronze valves, emboss'd with 

Tomyris 
And what she did to Cyrus after fight, 
But now fast barr'd. So here upon the flat 
All that long morn the lists were ham- 
mer' d up. 
And all that morn the heralds to and fro, 
With message and defiance, went and came : 
Last, Ida's answer, in a royal hand. 
But shaken here and there, and rolling words 
Oration-like. I kiss'd it anil I read: 



A M ED LEY 



'O brother, you have known the pangs we 

felt, 
What heats of indignation when we heard 
Of those that iron-cramp'd their women's feel ; 
Of hinds in which at the altar the poor hride 
Gives her harsh groom for bridal-gift a 

scourge : 
Of living hearts thai crack within the fire 
Where smoulder their dead despots; and of 

those, — 
Mothers, — that, all prophetic pity, fling 
Their pretty maids in the running Hood, and 

swoops 
The vulture, beak and talon, at the hear! 
.Made for all noble motion. And I saw 
Thai equal baseness lived in sleeker times 
With smoother men; the old leaven leaven'd 

all ; 
Millions of throats would bawl for civil rights, 
No woman named: therefore I set my lace 
Against all men. and lived but for mine own. 
Far off from men I luiilt a fold for them; 
I stored it full of rich memorial; 
I fenced it round with gallant institutes, 
And biting laws to scare the beasts of prey, 
And prospered, till a rout of saucy boys 
15 rake on us at our hooks, and niarr'd our 

pcac e, 
.M -k'd like our maids, blustering 1 know not 

what 
Of insolence and love, some pretext held 
Of baby troth, invalid, since my will 
Scal'd not the bond — the striplings! — for 

tin ir sport ! — 
I tamed mv leopards; shall I not tame these? 
Or you? or I? for since you think me touch'd 
In honor — what ! I would not aughl of 

false— 
F not our cause pure.' and whereas I know 
Your prone.--. Ar.ic. and what mother's blood 
You draw from, fight ! You failing, I abide 
What end soever; fail you "ill not. Still, 
Take not his life, he risk'd it for mv own; 
His mother lives. Yet whatsoe'er you do, 



Fight and fight well; strike and strike home. 

deal- 
Brother-, the woman's angel guards you, you 
The sole men to he mingled with our cause, 
The sole men we shall prize in the aftertime, 
Your very armor hallow'd, and your statues 
Kear'd. sung to, when, this gadfly brush'd 

aside. 

We plant a solid foot into the Time, 
And mould a generation strong to move 
With claim-on claim from right to right, till 

she 

Whose name is yoked with children's know 
herself; 

And Knowledge in our own land make her 

free. 
And. ever following those two-crowned twin-. 
Commerce and Conquest, shower the fiery 

grain 
Of freedom- broadcast over all that orbs 
Between the Northern and the Southern morn.' 

Then came a postscript ela-h'd across the 
rest: 

"See that there he no traitors in your camp. 

We seem- a nest of traitors none to trust 
Since our arm- fail'd — this Egypt-plague of 

men ! 
Almost our maids were better at their homi -. 
Than thus man girdled here. Indeed I think 
Our chiefest comfort is the little child 
Of one unworthy mother, which she left. 
She shall not have it back; the child shall 

grow 
To prize the authentic mother of her mind. 
I took it for an hour in mine own- bed 
This morning: there the tender orphan hands 
Felt at my heart, and seem'd to charm from 

thence' 
The wrath I nursed against the world. 

Farewell.' 

I ceased; he said, 'Stubborn, hut she may 

-it 





THE PRIN CESS 




Upon a king's right hand in thunderstorms, 
And breed up warriors! See now, tho' your- 
self 
Be dazzled by the wildfire Love to sloughs 
Thai swallow common sense, the spindling 

king, 
This (Jama swamp'd in lazy tolerance. 
When the man wants weight, the woman takes 

it up, 
And topples down the scales : hut this is li\l 
As are the roots of earth and hase of all, — 
Man for the field and woman for the hearth; 
Man for Hie sword, anil for the needle she; 
Man with the head, and woman with the 

heart ; 
Man to command, and woman to obey; 
All else confusion. Look you! the gray mare 
Is ill to live with, when her whinny shrills 
From tile to scullery, and her small goodmaii 
Shrinks in his arm-chair while the fires of hell 
Mix with his hearth. But you — she's yet a 

colt- 
Take, break her; strongly groom'd and 

strait ly curb'd 
She might not rank with those detestable 
That let the bantling scald at home, and 

brawl 
Their rights or wrongs like potherbs in the 

street. 
They say she's comely; there's the fairer 

chance. 
/ like her none the less for rating at her! 
Besides, the woman wed is not as we, 
But suffers change of frame. A lusty brace 
Of* twins may weed her of her folly. Boy, 
The bearing and the training of a child 
Is woman's wisdom.' 

Thus the hard old king. 
I took my leave, for it was nearly noon ; 
I pored upon her letter which I held, 
And on the little clause, 'take not his life ;' 
I mused on that wild morning in the woods. 
And on the 'Follow, follow, thou shalt win :' 
I thought on all the wrathful king had said. 



And how the strange betrothment was to end. 
Then I remcmber'd I hat burnt sorcerer's curse 
That one should fight with shadows and 

should fall: 
And like a flash the weird affection came. 
King, camp, and college turr'd to hollow 

show s : 
I sccm'd to move in old memorial tilts, 
And doing battle with forgotten ^hnsts. 
To dream myself the shadow of a dream; 
And ere I woke it was the point of noon. 
The lists wire ready. Empaiiopliid and 

plumed 
We entcr'd in, and waited, fifty there 
Opposed to fifty, till the trumpet blared 
At th - barrier like a wild horn in a land 
Of echoes, and a moment, and once more 
The trumpet, and again; at which the storm 
Of galloping hoofs bare on the ridge of 

spears 
And riders front to front, until they closed 
In conflict with the crash of shivering points, 
And thunder. Yet it seem'd a dream. I 

dream'd 
Of fighting. On his haunches rose the steed, 
And into fiery splinters leapt the lance, 
And out of stricken helmets sprang the fire. 
Part sat like rocks; part reel'd but kept their 

seats ; 
Part roll'd on the earth and rose again and 

drew; 
Part stumbled mixt with floundering horses. 

Down 
Fi'om those two bulks at Arac's side, and 

down 
From Arac's arm. as from a giant's flail, 
The large blows rain'd, as here and every- 
where 
lie rode the mellay, lord of the ringing lists, 
And all the plain — brand, mace, and shaft, 

and shield — 
Shock'd, like an iron-clanging anvil bang'd 
With hammers: till I thought, can this be he 
From Gama's dwarfish loins'- if this be so, 



A MEDLEY 



The mother makes us most — an<l in my dream 
I glanced aside, and saw the palace-front 
Alive with fluttering scarfs and ladies' eyes, 
And highest, among the statues, statin like, 
Between a cymbal'd Miriam and a Jael, 
W'ilh Psyche's babe, was Ida watching us, 
A single hand of gold about her hair. 
Like a saint's glory up in heaven; hut she, 
No saint — inexorable — no tenderness — 
Too hard, too cruel. Yrt she sees me fight, 
Yea. let her see me fall. With that 

I drave 
Among the thickest and bore down a prince, 
And Cyril One. Yea, let me make my dream 
All thai I would. Hut that large-moulded 

man. 
His visage all agrin as at a wake, 
.Made at me thro' the press, and. staggering 

haek 
With stroke on stroke the horse and horse- 
man, came 
As romc s a pillar of electric cloud, 
Flaying the roofs and sucking up the drains, 
And shadowing down the champaign till it 
strikes 



On a wood, and takes, and breaks, and cracks, 

and splits, 
And twists tin grain with such a roar that 

Earth 
Reels, and the herdsmen crv : for everything 
Gave way before him. Only Florian, he 
That loved me closer than his own right eye, 
Thrust in between; but Arac rode him down. 
And Cyril seeing it. push'd against the Prince, 
With Psyche's color round his helmet, 

tough, 
Strong, supple, sin, \* corded, apt at arms; 
But tougher, heavier, stronger, he that -mote 
And threw him. Last I spurr'd; 1 felt my 

veins 
Stretch with fierce heat; a moment hand to 

hand. 
And sword to sword, and hor.se to horse we 

hung. 
Till I struck out and shouted; the blade 

glanced, 
I did but shear a feather, and dream and 

truth 
Flow'd from me; darkness closed me, and 1 

fell. 







SONG 



Home they brought her warrior dead; 

She nor - w < 11 in '< I nor uttered cry. 



Home they brought her warrior dead ; 

She nor swoon'd nor utter'd cry. 
All her maidens, watching, said, 

'She must weep or she will die.' 

Then they praised him, soft and low, 
Call'd him worthy to be loved, 

Truest friend and noblest f op ; 

Yet she neither spoke nor moved. 

Stole a maiden from her place, 
Lightly to the warrior stept, 

Took the face-cloth from the face; 
Yet she neither moved nor wept. 

Rose a nurse of ninety j-ears, 
Set his child upon her knee — 

Like summer tempest came her tears — 
'Sweet mv child, I live for thee.' 



PART SIX 











. ; 



6 

I 


1 


'''.- 








PART SIX 



My dream had never died or lived again; 
As in some mystic middle state I lav. 
Seeing I saw not, hearing not I heard; 

Tlio', if I saw not, vet they told me all 
So often that I speak as having seen. 

For so it seein'd. or SO they said to me, 
That all things grew more tragic and more 

strange : 
That, when our side was vanquish'd and my 

cause 
l'( r ever lost, there went up a great cry, 
'The Prince i> slain!' My father heard and 

ran 
In on the li^ts. and there unlaced my casque 
And grovell'd on my body, and after him 

Came Psyche, sorrowing lor Aglaia. 
Hut high upon the palaci Ida stood 



With Psyche's babe in arm; there on the 

roofs 
Like that great dame of Lapidoth she sang. 

'Our enemies have fallen, have fallen: the 
seed, 
The little seed they laugh'd at in the dark. 
Has risen and cleft tin soil, and grown a hulk 
of spanless girth, that lavs on ever} side 
A thousand arms and rushes to the sun. 

'Our enemies have fallen, have fallen: they 

came : 
The leaves were wei with woman's tears; they 

heard 
A noise of songs they would not understand; 
They mark'd it with the red cross to the fall, 
And would have strown it. and are fallen 

thenisi ilvi -. 



THE PRINCESS 




■1 f, 










'Our enemies have fallen, have fallen: they 

came, 
The woodmen with their axes: In the tree! 
But we "ill makr it faggots for the hearth. 
And shape it plank and beam for roof and 

floor, 
And boats and bridges for the use of men. 

'Our enemies have fallen, have fallen: they 

struck ; 
With their own blows they hurt themselves, 

nor knew 
There dwelt an iron nature in the grain; 
The glittering axe was broken in their arms, 
Their arms were shatter'd to the shoulder 

blade. 

'Our enemies have fallen, but this shall 

grow 
A night of summer from the heat, a breadth 
Of Autumn, dropping fruits of power; and 

roll'd 
With music in the growing breeze of Time, 
The tops shall strike from star to star, the 

fangs 
Shall move the stony bases of the world. 

'And now, maids, behold our sanctuary 
Is violate, our laws broken ; fear we not 
To break them more in their behoof, whose 

arms 
Champion'd our cause and won it with a day 
Blanch'd in our annals, ami perpetual feast, 
When dames and heroines of the golden year 
Shall strip a hundred hollows bare of Spring, 
To rain an April of ovation round 
Their statues, borne aloft, the three ; but 

come, 
We will be liberal, since our rights are won. 
Let them not lie in the tent.s with coarse man- 
kind, 
111 nurses ; but descend, and proffer these 
The brethren of our blood and cause, that 
there 



Lie bruised and maim'd, the tender ministries 
Of female hands and hospitality.' 

She spoke, and with the babe yet in her 

arms. 
Descending, hurst the great bronze valves, 

and led 
A hundred maids in train across the park. 
Sonic cowl'd, and some hare-Leaded, on they 

came. 
Their feet in flowers, her loveliest. Bv them 

went 
The enamor'd air sighing, and on their curls 
From the high tree the blossom wavering fell, 
And over them the tremulous isles of lighl 
Slided. they moving under shade: hut Blanche 
At distance follow "d. So they came : anon 
Thro' open field into the lists they wound 
Timorously ; and as the leader of the herd 
That holds a stately fretwork to the sun. 
And follow'd up by a hundred airy does. 
Steps with a tender foot, light as on air. 
The lovely, lordly creature floated on 
To where her wounded brethren lay : there 

stay'd, 
Knelt on one knee, — the child on one, — and 

prest 
Their hands, and call'd them dear deliverers. 
And happy warriors, and immortal names, 
And said, 'You shall not lie in the tents, bul; 

here, 
And nursed by those for whom you fought, 

and served 
With female hands and hospitality.' 

Then, whether moved by this, or was it 

chance, 
She past my way. Up started from my side 
The old lion, glaring with Lis whelpless eye, 
Silent: hut when she saw me lying stark, 
Dishelm'd and mute, and motionlessly pale. 
Cold even to her, she sigh'd ; and when she 

saw 
The hao'u'ard father's face and reverend beard 



A M E D LEY 



Of grisly twine, all dabbled with the blood 
Of his own son, shudder'd, a twitch of pain 
Tortured her mouth, and o'er her forehead 

past 
A shadow, and her hue changed, and -he -aid: 
'He saved my life; my brother slew him 

for it/ 
No more: at which the king in bitter scorn 
Drew from- my neck the painting and the 

tress, 
And held them up. She saw them, ami a day 
Rose from the distance on her memory, 
'When the good queen, her mcther, shore the 

tress 
With kisses, ere the days of Lady Blanche. 
Ami thin once more she look'd at my pale 

fan : 
Til] understanding all tin foolish work 
of Fancy, and the bitter close of all. 
Her iron will was broken in her mind: 
Her noble heart was molten in her breast ; 
She bow'd, -I i set the child on the earth; she 

laid 
A feeling finger on my brows, and presently 
'< > Sire,' -he -aid. 'he live-; he is not dead! 
(), let me have him with my brethren lure 
In our own palace; we will tend on him 
Like one of these: if SO, by any mean'-. 
To lighten this great clog oi thanks, that 

make 
Our progress falter to the woman*- goal.' 



It- body, and reach it.- fatling innocent anus 
And lazy lingering fingers. She the appeal 
Brook'd not, but clamoring out "Mine — 

mine — not your- ! 
It is not your-, but mine; give me tin child!' 
Ceased all on tremble: piteous was tin cry. 
So stood the unhappy mother open-mouth'd, 
And turn'd each face her way. Wan was her 

cheek 
With hollow watch. In r blooming mantle torn. 
Red grief and mother's hunger in her eye, 
And down dead-heavy sank her curl-, and 

half 

The -acrid mother's bo-oni. panting, burst 
The laCCS toward her babe: but -he nor cared 

Nor knew it. clamoring on, till Ida heard, 
Look'd up. and li.s'no' slowly from me, stood 
Erect and silent, striking with her glance 
The mother, me, the child. Bui he thai lay 
Beside us, Cyril, batter'd a- he was, 
Trail'd himself up on one knee; then he drew 
Her robe to meei his lips, and down she 

look'd 
At the arm'd man sideways, pitying as it 

-i i m'd, 
Or self-involved: but when she learnt his face. 
Remembering hi- ill-omen'd song, an 
Once more thro' all her height, and o'er him 

grew 
Tall as a figure lengthen'd on the sand 
When the tale ebbs in sunshine, and he said; 




* <*■. 





















She said; but at the happy word 'he lives!' 
My father stoop'd, re-father'd o'er my 
wounds. 

So tho-c two foes above my fallen life, 
With brow to brow like night and evening 

mixt 
Their dark and gray, while Psyche ever stole 
A little nearer, till the babe that by us, 
Half lap! in glowing gauze and golden brede, 

I.a\ like a new fallen meteor on the ffrass, 

Uncared for, -pied its mother and began 
A blind ami babbling laughter, and to dance 



'0 fair and strong and terrible! Lioness 

That with your long lock- play the lion's 

mane ! 
But Love and Nature, these are two more 

terrible 
And stronger. Sec. your foot i- on our necks, 
We vanquish'd, you the victor of your will. 
What would you more.' give her the child! 

remain 
Orb'd in your isolation; he i.- dead. 
Or all as dead: henceforth we let you be. 
Win vmi tin In arts of women; and In ware 



THE PRINCESS 



A. 






£ 



mz^ r 



Lest, where von seels the common love of these, 
The common hate with the revolving wheel 

Should di-an,- you down, and some great 

Nemi sis 
Break from a darken'd future, crown'd with 

fire, 
And triad you out for ever. But howsoe'er 
Fixt in yourself, never in your own anus 

To hold your own, deny not hers to her, 
Give her the child! (), if, I say, you keep 
One pulse that heals true woman, it' you loved 
The breast that fed or arm that dandled you. 

Or own one port of sense not Hint to prayer. 
Give her the child' or if you scorn to lay it. 
Yourself, in hands SO lately claspt with yours, 
Or speak to her, your dearest, her one fault 
The tenderness, not yours, that could not kill. 
Give me it ; / will give it her.' 

He said. 
At first her eye with slow dilation roll'd 
Dry flame, she listening; after tank and sank 
And, into mournful twilight mellowing, dwelt 
Full on the child. She took it: 'Pretty hud! 
Lily of the vale! half-open'd bell of the 

woods ! 
Sole comfort of my dark hour, when a world 
Of traitorous friend and broken system made 
No purple in the distance, mystery, 
Pledge of a love not to be mine, farewell ! 
These men are hard upon us as of old, 
We too must part ; and yet how fain was I 
To dream thy cause embraced in mine, to 

think 
I might be something to thee, when I felt 
Thv helpless warmth about my barren breast 
In the dead prime ; but may thy mother prove 
As true to thee as false, false, false to me! 
And, if thou needs must bear the yoke, I 

wish it 
Gentle as freedom' — here she kiss'd it; then — ■ 
'All good go with thee ! take it, sir,' and so 
Laid the soft babe in his hard-mailed hands, 
Who turn'd half-round to Ps3'che as she 

sprang 



To meet it, with an eye that swum in thanks; 
Then felt it sound and whole from bead to 

foot, 
And hugg'd and never hugg^ it close 

enough, 
And in her hunger mouth'd and mumbled it, 
And hid her bosom with it; after that 
Put on more calm and added .suppliant ly : 

'We two were friends: I go to mine own 

land 
For ever. Find some other: as for me 
I scarce am fit for your great plans: yet spealt 

to me, 
Say one soft word and let me part forgiven.' 

But Ida spoke not, rapt upon the child. 
Then Arac: 'Ida — 'sdeath! you blame the 

man ; 
You wrong yourselves — the woman is so hard 
Upon the woman. Come, a grace to me! 
I am your warrior; I and mine have fought 
Your battle. Kiss her; take her hand, she 

weeps. 
'Sdeath ! I would sooner fight thrice o'er than 

see it.' 

But Ida spoke not, gazing on the ground, 

And reddening in the furrows of his chin. 
And moved beyond his custom, Gama said: 

'I've heard that there is iron in the blood. 
And I believe it. Not one word? not one'-' 
Whence drew you this steel temper? not 

from me, 
Not from your mother, now a saint with 

saints. 
She said you had a heart — I heard her say it — 
"Our Ida has a heart" — just ere she died— 
"But see that some one with authority 
Be near her still ;'' and I — I sought for one — 
All people said she had authority — 
The Lady Blanche — much profit! Not one 

word ; 



A M E D LEY 



No! tho' your father sues. See how you stand 
Stiff ;is Lot's wife, and all the good knights 

maim'd, 
I trust that there is no one hurt to death, 
For your wild whim. And was it then for 

this, 
Was it for thi- w<> gave our palace up, 
Where we withdrew from summer heats and 

state. 
And had our wine and chess beneath the 

planes, 
And man j a pleasant hour with her that's 

gone, 
Ere you were born to vex us? Is it kind.' 
Speak to her, I saj : is this not --he of whom, 
When first she came, all flush'd you said 

to me, 
Now had you got a friend of your own age, 
Now could you share your thought, now 

should men see 
Two women faster welded in one love 
Than pairs of wedlock!' she you walk'd with, 

she 

You talk'd with, whole nights long, up in the 

tower, 
Of sine and arc. spheroid and azimuth, 
And right ascension, heaven knows what : and 

now 
A word, hut one, one little kindly word. 
Not one to spare her. Out upon you, flint! 
You love nor her, nor me, nor any ; nay. 
You shame your mother's judgment too. 

Not one ? 

You will not? Well — no heart have you, or 

such 

As fancies like the vermin in a nut 

Have fretted all to dust and bitterness. 9 

So said the small king moved beyond his wont. 

But Ida stood nor spoke, drain'd of her 
force 
By many a varying influence and so long. 
Down thro' her limbs a drooping languor 
wept : 



Her head a little bent : and on her mouth 
A doubtful smile dwelt like a clouded moon 
In a still water. Then brake out my sire, 
Lifting his grim In ad from my wounds: 

'0 you, 
Woman, whom we thought woman even now, 

And were halt' fool'd to lit you tend our son, 
Because hi' might have wish'd it hut we see 
Tin accomplice of your madness un forgiven, 
And think that you might mix his draught 

with death. 

When your skies change again; tin rougher 

hand 
I- -alii-. On to the tent-: take up the Prince.' 

lie rose, and while each ear was prick'd to 

attend 
A tempest, thro' the cloud that dimm'd her 

broke 
A genial warmth and light once ■■ . and 

shone 
Thro' glittering drops on her sad friend. 

'Come hither, 
() Psyche,' she cried out, embrace me, come. 
Quick while I melt; make reconcilement sure 
With one that cannot keep her mind 

an hour: 
Come to the hollow heart they -lander so! 
Kiss and be friends, like children being chid! 
/ -rem no more, / want forgiveness too: 
I should have had to do with none hut maid-. 
That have no links with men. Ah false hut 

dear. 
D.ar traitor, too much loud, why'' — why? — 

yet see 
Before these kino- wi i mhiaei \ oil yet once 

more 
With all forgiveness, all oblivion, 
And t rust, not love, you k --. 

And now. () Sire, 
Grant me your son, to nurse, to wait upon 

him. 
Like mine own brother, lor m\ debt to him. 
This nightmare weight of gratitude, I know it. 




THE PRIN CESS 





Taunt me no more; yourself and yours shall 

have 
Free adit ; we will scatter all our maids 
Till happier times each to her proper hearth. 
What use to keep them here — now? grant my 

prayer. 
Help, father, brother, help; speak to the 

king; 
Thaw this male nature to some touch of that 
Which kills me with myself, and drags me 

down 
From my fixt height to mob me up with all 
The soft and milky rabble of womankind, 
Poor weakling even as they are.' 

Passionate tears 
Follow -'d ; the king replied not; Cyril said: 
'Your brother, lady, — Florian, — ask for him 
Of your great Head — for he is wounded too — 
That you may tend upon him with the 

Prince.' 
'Ay, so,' said Ida with a bitter smile, 
'Our laws are broken ; let him enter too. 
Then Aiolet, she that sang the mournful song, 
And had a cousin tumbled on the plain, 
Petition'd too for him. 'Ay, so,' she said, 
'I stagger in the stream ; I cannot keep 
My heart an eddy from the brawling hour. 
We break our laws with ease, but let it be.' 
'Ay, so?' said Blanche: 'Amazed am I to hear 
Your Highness ; but your Highness breaks 

with ease 
The law your Highness did not make ; 'twas I. 
I had been wedded wife, I knew mankind, 
And block'd them out ; but these men came to 

woo 
Your Highness,- — verily I think to win.' 

So she, and turn'd askance a wintry eye; 
But Ida, with a voice that, like a bell 
Toll'd by an earthquake in a trembling tower, 
Rang ruin, answer'd full of grief and scorn ; 

'Fling our doors wide ! all, all, not one, but 
all, 



Not only he, but by my mother's soul, 
Whatever man lies wounded, friend or foe, 
Shall enter, if he will! Let our girls flit. 
Till the storm die! but had you stood by us. 
The roar that breaks the Pharos from his 

base 
Had left us rock. She fain would sting us 

too, 
But shall not. Pass, and mingle with your 

likes. 
We brook no further insult, but arc gone.' 



She turn'd ; the very nape of her white neck 
Was rosed with indignation: but the Prince 
Her brother came: the king her father 

charm'd 
Her wounded soul with words ; nor did mine 

own 
Refuse her proffer, lastly gave his hand. 



Then us they lifted up, dead weights, and 

bare 
Straight to the doors ; to them the doors gave 

way 
Groaning, and in the vestal entry shriek'd 
The virgin marble under iron heels. 
And on they moved and gain'd the hall and 

there 
Rested; but great the crush was, and each 

base, 
To left and right, of those tall columns 

drown'd 
In silken fluctuation and the swarm 
Of female whispers. At the further end 
Was Ida by the throne, the two great cats 
Close by her, like supporters on a shield, 
Bow-back'd with fear; but in the centre stood 
The common men with rolling eyes ; amazed 
They glared upon the women, and aghast 
The women stared at these, all silent, save 
When armor clash'd or jingled, while the 

day. 



A MED LEY 



Descending, struck athwart the hall and shot 
A flying splendor out of brass and steel, 
That o'er the statues leapt from bead to head, 
Now fired an angry Pallas on the helm, 
Now set a wrathful Dian's moon on flame; 
And now and then an echo started up, 
And shuddering fled from room to room, and 

died 
Of fright in far apartments. 

Then the voice 
Of Ida sounded, issuing ordinance; 
And me they hore up the hroad stairs, and 

thro' 



Tlie long-laid galleries past a hundred doors 
To one deep chamber shut from sound, and 

due 
To languid limbs and sickness, left me in it ; 
And others otherwhere they laid: and all 
That afternoon a sound arose of hoof 
And chariot, many a maiden passing home 
Till happier times; but some were left 

Of tllOM- 

Held sagest, and the great lords out and in, 
From those two hosts that lay beside the wall, 
Walk'd at their will, and everything was 
changed. 




-HwrrtMMVrvrrM 







.^£_ '111 'I- t-N |^ 



SONG 



Ask me no more: the moon ma\ draw tin 
I'll, cloud m.i\ stoop from heaven and take 
l In shape, 



Ask me no more : the moon may draw the sea ; 
The cloud may stoop from heaven and take 

the shape, 
With fold to fold, of mountain or of cape; 
But O too fond, when have I answer'd thee? 
Ask me no more. 

Ask me no more: what answer should I give? 
I love not hollow cheek or faded eye: 
Yet, O my friend, I will not have thee die! 

Ask me no more, lest I should bid thee live; 
Ask me no more. 

Ask me no more : thy fate and mine are seal'd ; 

I strove against the stream and all in vain ; 

Let the great river take me to the main. 
No more, dear love, for at a touch I yield; 
Ask me no more. 




II *>, hi' 




■ ; (jnwrCJL'WWfQmsi 




P A RT S EVEN 



So was their sanctuary violated, 
So their fair college turn'd to hospital, 
At first with all confusion; by and by 
Sweet order livid again with other laws, 
A kindlier influence reign'd, and everywhere 
Low voices with the ministering hand 
Hung round the sick. The maidens came, 

the\ talk'd, 
They sang, they read: iill she not lair began 
To gather light, and she that was became 
Her former beauty treble; and to and fro 
With books, with flowers, with ano,i I others. 

Like creatures native unto gracious act, 

And in their own eleai element, they moved. 

Hut sadness on the soul of Ida till. 
And hatred of her weakness, blent with 

shame. 
Old studies fail'd; seldom she spoke: hut oft 



Clomb to the roofs, and gazed alone for hours 
On that disastrous leaguer, swarms of men 
Darkening her female field. Void was her 

use, 
And she as one that climbs a jieak to gaze 
O'er land and main, and sees a great black 

cloud 
Drag inward from tin deeps, a wall of night, 
Blot out the slope of sea from verge to shore, 
And suck tin blinding splendor from the 

sand. 
And quenching lake by lake and tarn by tarn 
Expunge the world: so fared she gazing 

there. 

So blacken'd all her world in secret, blank 
And waste it seem'd and vain: till down she 

came, 
And found fair peace oner more among the 

sick. 



THE P RI N CESS 





And twilight dawn'd; and mom by morn 

the lark 
Shot up ami shrill'd in flickering gyres, but I 
Lav silent in the muthVd cage of life. 
And twilight gloom'd, and broader-grown the 

bowers 
Drew I he great night into themselves, and 

heaven, 
Star after -tar, arose and fell; 1ml I, 
Deeper than those weird doubts could reach 

mi. lay 
Quito sunder' d from the moving Universe, 
Nor knew what eve was on me, nor the hand 
That nursed me, more than infants in their 

sleep. 

Hut Psyche tended Florian; with her oft 
Melissa came, for Blanche had gone, 

hut left 
Her child among us, willing she should keep 
Court-favor. Here and there the small bright 

head, 
A light of healing, glanced about the couch, 
Or thro' the parted silks the tender face 
Peep'd, shining in upon the wounded man 
With blush and smile, a medicine in them- 
selves 
To wile the length from languorous hours, 

and draw 
The sting from pain; nor seem'd it strange 

that soon 
He rose up whole, and those fair charities 
Join'd at her side ; nor stranger seem'd that 

hearts 
So gentle, so employ'd. should close in love, 
Than when two dewdrops on the petal shake 
To the same sweet air, and tremble deeper 

down. 
And slip at once all-fragrant into one. 

Less prosperously the second suit obtain'd 
At first with Psyche. Not tho' Blanche had 

sworn 
That after that dark night among the fields 



She needs must wed him for her own good 

name ; 
Not tho' he built upon the babe restored; 
Not tho' she liked him, yielded she, but fear'd 
To incense the Head once more; till on a day 
Winn Cyril pleaded, Ida came behind 
Seen but of Psyche; on her foot she hung 
A moment, and she heard, at which her face 
A little flush'd, and she past on: hut each 
Assumed from thence a half-consent involved 
In stillness, plighted troth, and were at peace. 

Nor only these ; Love in the sacred halls 
Held carnival at will, and flying struck 
With showers of random sweet on maid and 

man. 
Nor did her father cease to press my claim, 
Nor did mine own now reconciled; nor yet 
Did those twin brothers, risen again and 

whole; 
Nor Arac, satiate with his victory. 

But I lay still, and with me oft she sat. 
Then came a change; for sometimes I woidd 

catch 
Her hand in wild delirium, gripe it hard, 
And fling it like a viper off, and shriek, 
'You are not Ida :' clasp it once again, 
And call her Ida, tho' I knew her not, 
And call her sweet, as if in irony, 
And call her hard and cold, which seem'd a 

truth; 
And still she fear'd that I should lose my 

mind, 
And often she believed that I should die; 
Till out of long frustration of her care, 
And pensive tendance in the all-weary noons, 
And watches in the dead, the dark, when 

clocks 
Throhb'd thunder thro' the palace floors, or 

call'd 
On flying Time from all their silver tongues — 
And out of memories of her kindlier days. 
And sidelong glances at my father's grief, 



A M EDLEY 



And at the happy lovers heart in heart — 
And out of hauntings of my spoken love, 
And lonely listenings to my niutter'd dream, 
And often feeling of the helpless hands, 
And wordless broodings on the wasted check — 
From all a closer interest flourish'd up, 
Tenderness toucli by touch, and last, to these, 
Love, like an Alpine harebell hung with (ears 
By some cold morning glacier: frail at first 
And feeble, all unconscious of itself. 
But such as gather'd color day by day. 

Last I woke sane, but well-nigh close to 

death 
For weakness. It was evening; silent light 
Slept on the painted walls, wherein were 

wrought 
Two grand designs; for on one side arose 
The women up in wild revolt, and storm'd 
At the Oppian law. Titanic shapes, they 

cramm'd 
The forum, and half-crush'd among the rest 
A dwarf-like Cato cower'd. On the other side 
Hortensia spoke against the tax: behind, 
A train of dames. By axe and eagle sat. 
With all their foreheads drawn in Unman 

scowls, 
And half the wolf's-milk curdled in their 

veins, 
The fierce triumvirs; and before them paused 
Hortensia, pleading; angry was her face. 

I saw the forms ; I knew not where I was. 
They did hut look like hollow shows; nor more 
Sweet Ida. Palm to palm she sat: the dew 
Dwelt in her eyes, and softer all her shape 
And rounder .seemM. I moved, I sigh'd: a 

touch 
Came round my wrist, and tears upon my 

hand. 
Then all for languor and self-pity ran 
Mine down my face, and with what life I had, 
And like a flower that cannot all unfold, 
So drench'd it is with tempest, to the sun, 



Yet, as it may, turns toward him, I on her 
Fixt my faint eves, ami utter'd whisperingly : 

'If you he what I think you, some sweet 
dream, 
I would hut ask you to fulfil yourself; 
Hut if you he th.at Ida whom I knew, 
I ask you nothing: only, if a dream. 
Sweet dii am. be perfect. I shall die to-night. 
Stoop down and seem to kiss me ere I die.' 

I could no more, but lav like one in trance, 
That hears his burial talk'd of by his friends, 
And cannot speak, nor move, nor make one 

sign, 
But lies and diiads his d i. She turn'd, 

she paused. 

She stoop'd; and out of languor leapt a cry, 
Leapt fiery Passion from the brinks of death, 
And I believed that in the living world 
My spirit closed with Ida's at the lips: 
Till back I fell, and from mine arms she rose 
Glowing all over noble shame; and all 
Her falser self slip! from her like a robe, 
And left her woman, lovelier in her mood 
Than in her mould that other, whin she came 
From barren deeps to conquer all with love, 
And down the streaming crystal drojit ; and 

she 
Far-fleeted by the purple island-sidi s, 

Naked, a double light In air and wave, 
To meet her Graces, where they deck'd her out 
For worship without end nor end of' mine, 
Stateliest, for thee! hut mute she glided forth. 
Nor glanced behind her. and I sank and slept, 
Fill'd thro" and thro' with love, a happv sle< p. 

Deep in the night I woke: she, near me, 
held 
A \ olume of I he poi is it' her land. 
There t" herself, all in low tones, she read: 

'Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the 
white ; 




- 







t 



THE P RIN CESS 




- 



Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk ; 
Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font. 
The fire-fly wakens; waken thou with me. 

"Now droops the milk-white peacock like a 
ghost, 
And like a ghost she glimmers on to me. 



'Now lies the Earth all Danae to the stars, 
And all thy heart lies open unto me. 

'Now slides the silent meteor on. and leaves 
A shining furrow, as thy thoughts in me. 

'Now folds the lily all her sweetness up, 
And slips into the bosom of the lake. 
So fold thyself, my dearest, thou, and slip 
Into my bosom and be lost in me.' 

I heard her turn the page ; she found a 
small 
Sweet idyl, and once more, as low, she read : 

"Come down, O maid, from yonder mountain 

height. 
What pleasure lives in height (the shepherd 

sang), 
In height and cold, the splendor of the hills? 
But cease to move so near the heavens, and 

cease 
To glide a sunbeam by the blasted pine, 
To sit a star upon the sparkling spire ; 
And come, for Love is of the valley, come, 
For Love is of the valley, come thou down 
And find him ; by the happy threshold, he, 
Or hand in hand with Plenty in the maize, 
Or red with spirted purple of the vats, 
Or foxlike in the vine ; nor cares to walk 
With Death and Morning on the Silver 

Horns, 
Nor wilt thou snare him in the white ravine, 
Nor find him dropt upon the firths of ice, 
That huddling slant in furrow-cloven falls 
To roll the torrent out of dusky doors. 



But follow ; let the torrent dance thee down 
To find him in the valley; let the wild 
Lean-headed eagles yelp alone, and leave 
The monstrous ledges there to slope, and spill 
Their thousand wreaths of dangling water- 
smoke, 
That like a broken purpose waste in air. 
So waste not thou, but come: for all the vales 
Await thee; azure pillars of the hearth 
Arise to thee; the children call, and I 
Tli\ shepherd pipe, and sweet is every sound, 
Sweeter thy voice, but every sound is sweet ; 
Myriads of rivulets hurrying thro' the lawn, 
The moan of doves in immemorial elms, 
And murmuring of innumerable bees.' 

So she low-toned, while with shut eyes I lay 
Listening, then look'd. Pale was the perfect 

face ; 
The bosom with long sighs labor'd ; and meek 
Seem'd the full lips, and mild the luminous 

eyes, 
And the voice trembled and the hand. She 

said 
Brokenly, that she knew it, she had i'ail'd 
In sweet humility, had fail'd in all ; 
That all her labor was but as a block 
Left in the quarry; but she still were loth, 
She still were loth to yield herself to one 
That wholly scorn'd to help their equal rights 
Aaainst the sons of men and barbarous laws. 

o 

She pray'd me not to judge their cause from 

her 
That wrong'd it, sought far less for truth 

than power 
In knowledge. Something wild within her 

breast, 
A greater than all knowledge, beat her down. 
And she had nursed me there from week to 

week ; 
Much had she learnt in little time. In part 
It was ill counsel had misled the girl 
To vex true hearts; yet was she but a girl — 
'Ah fool, and made myself a queen of farce! 



A M ED LEY 



When comes another such? never, I think, 
Till the sun drop, dead, from the signs.' 

Her voice 
Choked, and her forehead sank upon her 

hands, 
And In r ureal heart thro' all tin faultful past 
Went sorrowing in a pause I dared not break; 
Till notice of a change in the dark world 
Was lispt about the acacias, and a bird. 
That early woke to feed her little ones. 
Sent from a dewy breast a cry for light. 
She moved, and at her feet Hie volume fell. 

'Blame not thyself too much,' I said, 'nor 

blame 
Too much the sons of men and barbarous 

laws ; 
These were the rough ways of the world till 

now. 
Henceforth thou bast a helper, me, that know- 
Tin woman's cause is man's; they rise or sink 
Together, dwarf d or godlike, bond or free. 
For she that out of Lethe scales with man 
The shining steps of Nature, shares with 

man 
His nights, bis days, moves with him to one 

goal. 
Sla\s all the fair young planet in her hands — 
If she be small, slight-natured. miserable, 
I low shall men grow? but work no more alone 
Our place is much; as far as in us lies 
We two will serve them both in aiding her — 
Will clear away the parasitic tonus 
That seem to keep her up but drag her 

down — 
Will leave tier space to burgeon out of all 
Within her — let her make herself her own 
To give or keep, to live and learn and be 
All that not harms distinctive womanhood. 
For woman is not undevelopt man. 
But diverse. Could we make her as the man. 
Sweet Love were slain; his diarist bond is 

this. 

Not like to like, but like in difference. 



Yet in the' long years liker must they grow; 

The man be more of woman, she of man; 

lie gain in sweetness ami in moral height, 

Nor lose the wrest lino- thews that throw the 
w orld ; 

She mental breadth, nor fail in childward care, 

Nor lost tin childlike in the larger mind; 

Till at the last sin sit herself to man. 

Like perfect music unto noble words; 

And so tins, twain, upon the skirts of Time, 

Sit side by sidi , full-summ'd in all their 
powers, 

Dispensing harvest, sowing the to-be, 

Self-reverent each and reverencing each, 

Distinct in individualities, 

Hut like each nt In r even as those who love. 

Then comes tin statelier Eden back to nun; 

Then reign the world's great bridals, chaste 
and calm ; 

Then springs the crowning race of human- 
kind. 

.May these things be!' 

Sighing she spoke: "I fear 

They will not.' 

'Dear, but li t u- I \ pe flu in now 

In our own lives, and this proud watchword 
rest 

( )f i qua! ; seeing either sex alone 
Is half itself, and in true marriage \>>~ 
Nor equal, nor unequal. Each fulfils 
Defect in each, and always thought in 

thought, 
Purpose in purpose, will in will, tiny grow, 
'I'lu single pure ami perfect animal. 
The two-cell'd heart beating, with one full 

st roke, 
Life.' 

And again sighing she spoke: 'A dream 

That once was mine! what woman taught 
you this?' 

'Alone,' I said, 'from earlier than I know. 
Immersed in rich foreshadowings of tin world, 
I loved 'be woman. He, that doth not. lives 




THE PRINCESS 



A drowning life, besotted in sweet self, 

Or pines in sad experience worse than death, 

Or keeps his wing'd affections dipt with 

crime. 
Yet was there one thro' whom I loved her, one 
Not learned, save in gracious household 

ways, 
Not perfect, nay, but full of tender wants, 
No angel, hut a dearer being, all dipt 
In angel instincts, breathing Paradise, 
Interpreter between the gods and men. 
Who look'd all native to her place, and yet 
On tiptoe seem'd to touch upon a sphere 
Too gross to tread, and all male minds per- 
force 
Swav'd to her from their orbits as they 

moved. 
And girdled her with music. Happy he 
With such a mother! faith in womankind 
Heats with his blood, and trust in all things 

high 
Comes easy to him, and tho' he trip and fall 
He shall not blind his soul with clay.' 

'But I,' 
Said Ida, tremulously, 'so all unlike — 
It seems you love to cheat yourself with 

words : 
This mother is your model. I have heard 
Of your strange doubts; they well might be; 

I seem 
A mockery to my own self. Never, Prince! 
You cannot love me.' 

! Nay, but thee,' I said, 
'From yearlong poring on thy pictured eyes, 



Ere seen I loved, and loved thee seen, and 

saw 
Thee woman thro' the crust of iron moods 
That Qiask'd Lhee from men's reverence up, 

and forced 
Sweet love on prank> of saucy boyhood; now, 
Given hack to life, to lite indeed, thro' thee. 
Indeed I love. The new day comes, the light 
Dearer for night, as dearer thou for faults 
Lived over. Lift thine eye-.; my doubts are 

dead. 
My haunting sense of hollow shows; the 

change, 
This truthful change in thee has kill'd it. 

Dear, 
Look up, and let thy nature strike on mine, 
Like yonder morning on the blind halfworld. 
Approach and fear not; breathe upon my 

brows ; 
In that fine air I tremble, all the past 
Melts mist-like into this bright liour, and this 
Is morn to more, and all the rich to-come 
Reels, as the golden Autumn woodland reels 
Athwart the smoke of burning weeds. For- 
give me. 
I waste my heart in signs ; let be. My bride. 
My wife, my life! O, we will walk this world, 
Yoked in all exercises of noble end. 
And so thro' those dark gates across the wild 
That no man knows. Indeed I love thee; 

come, 
Yield thyself up : my hopes and thine are one. 
Accomplish thou my manhood and thyself; 
Lay thy sweet hands in mine and trust to me." 







CONCLUSION 













5 



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M 

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WBfs* 






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WMt* < 



CONCLUSION 



So closed our tale, of which I give you all 
Tlie random scheme as wildly as it rose. 
The words arc mostly mine; for when we 

ceased 
There came a minute's pause, and Walter 

said, 
'I wish she had not. yielded!' then to me, 
'What if you drest it up poetically!' 
So pray'd the men, the women: I gave assent. 
Yet how to bind the scattered scheme of seven 
Together in one sheaf? What style could 

suit? 
The men required that I should give through- 
out 
The sort of mock-heroic gigantesque, 
With which we banter' d little Lilia fir^t : 
Tlie women — and perhaps tlie} - felt their 

power, 
For something in the ballads which they sang, 
Or in their silent influence as they sat. 



Had ever seem'd to wrestle with burlesque, 
And drove us, last, to quite a solemn 

close — 
They hated banter, wish'd for something 

real, 
A gallant fight, a noble prince — why 
Nut make her true-heroic — true sublime? 
Or all, they said, as earnest as the close? 
Which yel with such a framework scarce 

could be. 
Then rose a little find betwixt the two, 
Betwixt the mockers and the realists; 
And I, betwixt them both, to please them 

both. 
And yet to give the story a* it rose, 
I moved as in a strange diagonal, 
And maybe neither pleased myself nor them. 

But Lilia pleased me. for she took no pari 

In our dispute ; the sequel of the tale 



THE PRIN CESS 







- 



V, 



Had touch'd her, and she sat. she pluck'd the 

grass, 
She flung it from her, thinking; but, she fi\t 
\r A showery glance upon her aunt, and said, 

'You — tell us what we are" — who might have 

told, 
For sin was cranun'd with theories out of 

h()()ks. 

But that there rose a shout. The gates were 

closi (1 
At sunset, and the crowd were swarming now. 
To take their leave, about the garden rails. 



So I and some went out to these; we climb'd 
The slope to Vivian-place, and turning saw 
The happy valleys, half in light, and half 
Far-shadowing from the west, a land of peace; 
Gray halls alone among their massive groves; 
Trim hamlets; here and there a rustic tower 
Half-lost in hclts of hop and breadths of 

wheat : 
The shimmering glimpses of a stream; the 

seas ; 
A red sail, or a white; and far beyond, 
Imagined more than seen, the skirts of 

France. 



'Look there, a garden !' said my college 

friend, 
The Tory member's elder son, 'and there ! 
God bless the narrow sea which keeps her off, 
And keeps our Britain, whole within herself, 
A nation vet, the rulers and the ruled — 
Some sense of duty, something of a faith, 
Some reverence for the laws ourselves have 

made, 
Some patient force to change them when we 

will, 
Some civic manhood firm against the crowd — 
But yonder, whiff! there comes a sudden heat, 
The gravest citizen seems to lost' his head. 
The king is scared, the soldier will not fight. 
The little boys begin to shoot and stab, 
A kingdom topples over with a shriek 



Like an old woman, and down rolls the world 
In mock heroics stranger than our own: 
Revolts, republics, revolutions, most 
No graver than a schoolboys' barring out : 
Too comic for the solemn things they are. 
Too solemn for the comic touches in them. 
Like our wild Princess with as wise a dream 

As some of theirs — God bless the narrow sea-! 
I wish they were a whole Atlantic broad.' 

'Have patience,' I replied, 'ourselves are 

full 
Of social wrong: and maybe wildest dreams 
Are but the needful preludes of the truth. 
For me, the genial day, the happy crowd. 
The sport half-science, fill me with a faith, 
This fine old world of ours is but a child 
Yet in the go-cart. Patience! Give it time 
To learn its limbs: there is a hand that 

guides.' 

In such discourse we gain'd the garden 

rails, 
And there we saw Sir Walter where he stood, 
Before a tower of crimson holly-oaks, 
Among six boys, head under head, and look'd 
No little lily-handed baronet he, 
A great broad-shouldered genial Englishman, 
A lord of fat prize-oxen and of sheep, 
A raiser of huge melons and of pine. 
A patron of some thirty charities, 
A pamphleteer on guano and on gram. 
A quarter-sessions chairman, able]- none; 
Fair-hair'd and redder than a windy morn; 
Now shaking hands with him, new him, of 

those 
That stood the nearest — now address'd to 

speech — 
Who spoke few words and pithy, such as 

closed 
Welcome, farewell, and welcome for the year 
To follow. A shout rose again, and made 
The long line of the approaching rookery 

swerve 



A M ED LEY 



From the elms, and shook the branches of the 

deer 
From slope l" slope thro' distant ferns, and 

rang 
Beyond the bourn of sunset — O, a shout 
More joyful Mian the city-roar that hails 
Premier or king ! Why should not thesi great 

sirs 
Give uj) their parks some dozen times a year 
To let the people breathe? So thrio thej 

cried, 
I likewise, and in groups they stream'd away. 

But we went back to the Abbey, and sat on, 
So much the gathering darkness charm'd; 

we sat 



But spoke not, rapt in nameless reverie, 
Perchance upon the future man. The walls 
Blacken'd about us, bats wheel'd, and owls 

whoop'd, 
And gradually the powers of the night, 
That range above thi region of the wind, 
Deepening the courts of twilight broke 

them up 
Thro' all the silent spaces of the worlds, 
Beyond all thought into the heaven of 

In a\ c iin. 

Last little I. ilia, rising quietly, 
Disrobed the glimmering statue of Sir Ralph 
From those rich silk>. and home well-pleased 

we «i ni. 



THJE l'.ND 



b 




I 






C, lill 



One copy del. to Cat. Div. 



OCT 4 "" 



